My Washington Times 'On Crime' Column On Retired Navy SEAL Jack Carr On 'Savage Son' And His Navy SEAL Character James Reece

The Washington Times published my On Crime column on retired Navy SEAL Jack Carr and his character former Navy SEAL James Reece.

With the publication of “Savage Son,” the third novel in the series that features former Navy SEAL James Reece, Jack Carr has become an established top-notch thriller writer.

“As a former Navy SEAL. Reece had recently proven himself particularly skillful at adapting; he’d outwitted a national security apparatus set on killing him and then unraveled a plot that put the president of the United States in the crosshairs,” Jack Carr writes in the beginning of “Savage Son.” 

“A man named Vic Rodriguez led the paramilitary branch of the Central Intelligence Agency as the director of the Special Activities Division. He’d then recruited Reece for the mission that had saved the president’s life and spared Ukraine from a chemical weapons attack. Vic recognized Reece’s aptitude for aggressive problem solving and wanted to bring the frogman further into the fold.”  

Jack Carr is the pen name of a retired Navy SEAL. He served from 1996 to 2016 and he went from an enlisted SEAL sniper, to a junior officer leading assault and sniper teams in Iraq and Afghanistan, to a platoon commander practicing counterinsurgency in the southern Philippines, to commanding a Special Operations Task Unit in the most Iranian influenced section of southern Iraq throughout the tumultuous drawdown of U.S. Forces.

As Mr. Carr notes in the preface of “Savage Son,” he was first introduced to Richard Connell’s great short story, “The Most Dangerous Game,” in junior high school. The short story, which appeared in Collier’s Weekly in 1924, was about a mad hunter on an island who hunted men.

“Upon that initial reading the story, I was determined to one day write a modern thriller that paid tribute to this classic tale, exploring the dynamic between hunter and hunted. Fast-forward thirty years. As I prepare to leave the SEAL Teams, I laid out my ideas for what would become my first novel, ‘The Terminal List.’” 

I reached out to Jack Carr and asked him how he would describe his character James Reece and his three thrillers; “The Terminal List,” “True Believer” and “Savage Son.”

“James Reece is a man on a journey. He is a likable guy you’d want to have a beer with but who can also flip a switch to get the job done. He has the training and experience to do the things he does in the novels. He is a student of war and of the hunt,” Mr. Carr replied. 

You can read the rest of the column below or via the below link: 

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/jun/29/jack-carr-on-savage-son-and-his-navy-seal-characte/

You can also read my Counterterrorism magazine Q&A with Jack Carr via the below link: 

www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2019/05/my-q-with-jack-carr-retired-navy-seal.html