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Avg. Rating: 4.5
politico-military potboiler
If you're looking for a Vietnam War novel, but you don't want to wade in too deep, this is perfect lightweight fare. Think of it as a cross between Tom Clancy and Graham Greene (see Orrin's review of The Quiet American)--with the civil servant as superhero trying to navigate a moral cesspool. Bradley Lawrence Marshall is the blue blood, war hero, diplomat who is sent to Vietnam as the personal emissary of President Johnson, to find a way out. In country, he meets with real figures like General Westmoreland, who tries to convince him everything is copacetic. But he also meets folks like: his driver, Corporal Mead, a decent though violent American lad of ambiguous sexuality, who is sick of the war; Lacouture, a flamboyant, Guy Burgess-like, Frenchman who sells information to all sides and loves Mead; and the insidious CIA station chief, Wilson Abbot Lord, who lives to fight the Communists and, fearing that Marshall will end the war, plots to kill him. And it's all set against the backdrop of the Tet Offensive. The whole premise, of Johnson and a bureaucrat secretly planning an exit strategy, doesn't withstand much scrutiny and the stereotypes and clichés run rampant. But taken on its own terms, as a sort of politico-military potboiler with only mild pretensions of addressing issues in any serious way, it succeeds pretty well. It's certainly a more diverting read than many of the more critically acclaimed novels of the war.
Wish it didn't have to end!
QUICK! Somebody grab Oliver Stone!! This book is the literary equivalent to Stone's Platoon, and on many levels superior! The characters are vivid. The scenery makes you feel like you're actually there, and the situations aren't so far fetched to make you doubt their plausibility. Peterson's biggest asset is his characterization. When a character is killed, you actually feel sorry for him. When two main characters are married, you feel tears of joy running down your face. The visualness makes you feel the action is unraveling on a big screen in front of you! Mr. Stone (or anybody in Hollywood, for that matter) had better hurry. I can see the film adaptation of this book becoming just as big a blockbuster as the book was a best seller!
Wouk meets Uris meets DeMille in Vietnam.
A powerful, moving (and fast-moving) drama of the Vietnam Warwith well-drawn and motivated characters,a compelling historical context,and the pace of a thriller. Much more like War&Remembrance (Wouk)or Armageddon (Uris) than like the typical Vietnam War novel.I highly recommend it.
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