Jack Carr's latest stays true to modern-day warrior mindset

If you’re looking for a silly social media meme, don’t look Jack Carr’s way.

The former Navy SEAL turned bestselling author avoids frivolous posts and scorching hot takes. Carr respects his audience too much.

'Essentially, China can launch attacks and maneuver forces before our generals are out of bed, which means we, in turn, have to do the same. So where does that lead us?'

“They’re trusting me with their time,” Carr tells Align. He treats his bestselling novels like “The Terminal List” and “The Devil’s Hand” with similar reverence. Few tomes boast the research and attention to detail Carr brings to the page.

His savvy blend of life experiences and muscular heroics make him the modern-day Vince Flynn or Tom Clancy.

His latest, “Red Sky Mourning" (released Tuesday), brings battle-tested hero James Reece into an adventure that reads as if Carr finished the final draft yesterday. A nuclear-armed Chinese submarine threatens World War III. An AI entity has oversized ties to America’s defense protocols. Duplicitous U.S. leaders use their power and clout for their personal ambitions.

Is Reece up to his greatest challenge yet?

Carr says he isn’t trying to mimic the headlines scrawling across our smartphones. It just ... happens.

“I don’t set out to write a timely story. It’s not part of the process,” he says.

He credits being an avid news consumer as well as his rich military history. He served 20 years in Naval Special Warfare, leading special operations teams in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the southern Philippines. That demanded he stay fully abreast of all critical information.

It’s all about “building trust with those below you and then above you in that chain of command so you have the freedom to maneuver on the battlefield,” he explains.

Carr’s red-meat hero is conservative catnip, but the author doesn’t drop partisan bromides in conversation. Reading “Red Sky Mourning” offers clues to a right-leaning worldview. It also explains how James Reece is evolving over the course of seven novels.

Call him a more cynical hero for our cynical times.

How could Reece be anything but given events like the disastrous 2021 U.S. pullout of Afghanistan, which turned the country back over to the Taliban in mere weeks.

“That was the best and brightest of our military,” he says of the men and women who helped secure the war-torn nation following the 9/11 attacks. “People with no military experience I am a hundred-percent sure would have done a better job than our senior-level military leaders. So there is that.”

“Red Sky Mourning” is about “questions of loyalty to a country, to intelligence services, to the military, to friends to family, to yourself,” he adds.

Sometimes Carr doesn’t just evoke the latest headlines. He’s ahead of the curve. He previously introduced Alice, the AI entity who plays a vital role in “Red Sky Mourning,” in past Reece adventures.

His stories drip with precise geopolitical nuggets along with fastidious details tied to the tools of war. That research finds him disappearing down “rabbit holes” toward new weaponry with real-world ramifications.

“Mourning” touches on “naval assets” with autonomous potential, like what he says China is exploring in recent years.

“Essentially, China can launch attacks and maneuver forces before our generals are out of bed, which means we, in turn, have to do the same. So where does that lead us?” he asks.

Carr’s signature hero is also the focus of “The Terminal List,” the Prime Video series starring Chris Pratt. The show proved a smash in its first season, and season two will be based on Carr’s second novel, “True Believer.”

There’s also a prequel saga underway tied to Taylor Kitsch’s character, Ben Edwards.

Carr, an executive producer on the shows, girded himself for the inevitable changes whenever a book makes the leap to the screen. In fact, the show’s portrayal of Ben Edwards took his fictional creation to new levels, he says.

The show's guiding light? “Staying true to the foundational elements of the story, meaning the mindset of a modern-day warrior,” he says.

Carr, the son of a librarian, predicted he’d be a writer when he was just a boy. Now, he’s a successful novelist with a pen name as potent as his signature hero.

The reality hasn’t fully matched those youthful dreams.

He imagined disappearing into a “cabin in the woods” secluded enough to get lost in his story.

“Today, there are so many other distractions that you’re competing with as an author … you’re competing with every single streaming service out there … It’s led to less people reading,” he says, a notion he cleverly teases in “Red Sky Mourning.”

That means he works social media carefully, shares episodes of his “Danger Close” podcast and pours everything he has into his military yarns.

His mission? Adding value to people’s lives is “always my goal,” he says.