It’s been a while since there has been a change of authors behind the Tom Clancy Ryanverse books, and the first time a duo have taken over. Andrews & Wilson are the authors behind the Tier One series.

To begin with, I was somewhat skeptical as I had read about some possible continuity errors. But with nearly 40 books in the Ryanverse series it must be incredibly difficult. In fact, so much so, I would love to know what the system is that’s used to hand over from one set of authors to another. It’s hard enough at times for a single author to maintain continuity in a single book, let alone multiple authors over so many books. Not to mention films and TV series that have also been made. Perhaps Tom Colgan at Penguin Random House has some sort of bible, character summaries or parameters? It certainly could be a good area to have AI support from an AI trained on all the books in the series.

Anyway, in the end there was nothing that detracted from the story, which itself was fantastic.

Act of Defiance was a sequel to The Hunt for the Red October, the novel that propelled Clancy to the fore in the 1980s. Set in the present, it picked up unknown lose ends from The Hunt for the Red October and spun a modern but authentic Clancy-esque thriller. In fact, it was probably the most authentic Clancy feeling book in the series since Clancy passed away.

However, providing an authentic Clancy feel isn’t the only important quality to Act of Defiance. I’ve been saying for a while, and looking for it, that there needed to be some new development in the Ryanverse to inject new possibilities, new characters. After all, there are now more Campus era books than pre-Campus.

I love the Campus and really enjoyed it’s initial introduction. But I had never imagined it would run this long, considering Rainbow only ever lasted one novel and had much of the same potential, albeit on the legal side of operations.

Way back when, I had thought things were going to be opened up after Peter Telep’s Against All Enemies set things up for new characters and areas of operations, but we never saw the follow up Search and Destroy.

And let’s face it, Jack Ryan Sr is as close to the end of his third term as president as he possibly can be. Something needs to change. I used to think the Campus might get exposed and it would take President Ryan down. The books that follow could then have been a long hard fight back for the Ryan family from an underdog situation.

But it seems more so now that the torch will be passed down. This book features his youngest daughter Katie, almost exclusively, as a Navy intelligence Lieutenant, thrust into the heart of a submarine drama, with so many echoes of The Hunt for the Red October I could almost hear the voice of Sean Connery as Markus Ramius.

Yes, Ramius walked right into the White House. A fleeting appearance, but an appearance nonetheless. And he wasn’t the only character to return or be mentioned from that first Clancy thriller.

Some may say that this book leaned too much on nostalgia but I disagree. Andrews & Wilson were daring for even touching on that hallowed ground. And it totally paid off.

I only hope that the same daring applies as they continue to take the series forward. I do wonder whether Katie may take over her father’s role, eventually. Perhaps with Mary Pat Foley briefly stepping in to bridge the gap as she builds experience. But this would be the easy option. And this series doesn’t need easy options. It needs authors bold enough to risk everything that came before, so it can continue to be great.

I dare say some big name characters may need to die, or be thought to be dead, just to open some things up. Katie’s brother Kyle was also introduced briefly in this book and may be a character in future novels. The next generation of the family pretty much fully introduced with more than one sit down family meal.

This book was solid. It has me more energised for what comes next than any previous novel.