SOURCE: "A Missile for Every Occasion," in New York Times Book Review, July 28, 1991, pp. 9-10.

In the following review, Kondracke offers a favorable assessment of The Sum of All Fears. According to Kondracke, "In its plotting, vividness and suspense, this is Mr. Clancy's best book since The Hunt for Red October."

One of Tom Clancy's many gifts as a writer of thrillers is that he constantly taps the current world situation for its imminent dangers and spins them into an engrossing tale. In 1984 and 1986, before United States-Soviet relations had begun to thaw, Mr. Clancy wrote The Hunt for Red October, in which the defection of a Soviet submarine captain nearly provokes World War III, and Red Storm Rising, in which a conventional World War III nearly leads to a nuclear war. In 1987, when Muammar el-Qaddafi seemed a greater menace than the Kremlin leadership. Mr. Clancy explored America's vulnerability...