What books did Sam Tallent and Joe Rogan recommend on JRE #2575?

Joe Rogan recommended Mark Greaney's Gray Man series about a CIA off-the-books assassin and Jack Carr's The Terminal List, written by a former Navy SEAL and adapted for Amazon with Chris Pratt. Sam Tallent recommended Rogue Male, about a man trying to assassinate Hitler, and Angels by Denis Johnson, which he called his favourite book. Both urged starting Cormac McCarthy with No Country for Old Men before reading Blood Meridian, which Tallent called the best book Americans have produced.

• Tallent also praised his friend Jordan Harper's crime novels.
• Tallent said Blood Meridian could only be filmed as a long animated feature.
• Tallent named William Burroughs's Queer and Junkie as early influences but said he hated Naked Lunch.

Source: our own transcription of the episode. The full conversation is on The Joe Rogan Experience (2026-11-03). Read the whole episode summary →

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