JACK CARR READING LIST

One of, if not my favorite novel of the past few years, The Son by Philipp Meyer, is the story of Texas and to a greater extent, of the American West through the eyes of a family carving their legacy in blood.  The non-linear storyline and changing perspectives through the use of multiple protagonists only add to the captivating writing.  It was adapted by AMC for a series starring Pierce Brosnan which I thought was extremely well done.  The Son is one of those novels you will wish you could read again for the first time.  “When the sun came up, we discovered a boy of nine years.  We left him as a witness. At noon we reached the river and saw the boy had followed us with his bow – for twenty miles he had kept up with men on horseback – for twenty miles he had been running to his death.  A child like that would be worth a thousand men today.  We left him standing on the riverbank.  As far as I know he is looking for me yet.”

The Charm School by Nelson DeMille is one of my all-time favorite thrillers.  I have such fond memories of reading this in my youth, dreaming of one day serving my country and then writing books like the very one I held in my hands.  The Charm School was so good and so impactful that I have not read it since it came out for fear that TOE, or time on earth, might have distilled some of its magic.  I worry that a second reading at this stage in my life might taint the memory I have of falling in love with it over thirty years ago.  I still have my original copy, a gift from my grandmother with her handwriting inside the front cover, pages yellowed by time; in those pages are an adventure I’ll never forget.

When asked to put together a professional reading list for the SEAL Teams, I jumped at the chance! Dereliction of Duty by H.R. McMaster was one of the first books on that list.  I read it during my Troop Commander tour at SEAL Team 7 and noted more than a few similarities between what McMaster describes so poignantly in his book and the policies I was on the receiving end of as we wound down our experience in Iraq in 2011. Written when the author was an Army Major and based on his doctoral thesis, H.R. McMaster would later be promoted to Lieutenant General and serve as National Security Advisor before accepting an academic position at Stanford.   This is a work that will make you think twice before blindly trusting your government or taking them at their word when they classify something “top secret.”  The subtitle of the book is telling: Lyndon Johnson, Robert McNamara, The Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies that Led to Vietnam.  Dereliction of Duty is required reading for all Americans, especially those who commit our sons and daughters to war.