The Hunt for Red October Clancy's writing style, which included technical details about weaponry, submarines, espionage, and the military. The accurate nature of Clancy's writing was well known among the American military that Clancy remarked in a 1986 interview: “When I met Navy Secretary John Lehman last year, the first thing he asked me about the book was, ‘Who the hell cleared it?’” The novel shares elements with James Clavell’s works, particularly "Shōgun" (1975) and "Noble House" (1981), where political power is used instead of physical confrontation with an enemy. Clancy portrays the Soviets as evil, comparing and contrasting their philosophies, morals, and values from
The Hunt for Red October novel as "the most satisfactory novel of a sea chase since C.S. Forester perfected the form". Due to an extensive marketing campaign by the Naval Institute Press for their first published work of fiction, which was initially aimed on the military, the book sold 45,000 copies by March 1985. Clancy said in a 1991 interview: “I thought we’d sell maybe five thousand or ten thousand hardcovers and that would be the end of it. I never really thought about making money.” After Reagan's endorsement, "The Hunt for Red October" topped the national bestseller lists, particularly "The New York Times". It