America's wars have inspired some of the world's best literature, and the is no exception By Marc Leepson

The Vietnam War has left many legacies. Among the most positive is an abundance of top-notch books, many written by veterans of the conflict. NONFICTION These include winners of National Book Awards and Pulitzer Prizes, AMERICA'S LONGEST WAR: • • • • • both fiction and nonfiction. A slew of war memoirs stand with the best THE UNITED STATES writing of that genre. Nearly all of the big books about the Vietnam War AND VIETNAM, 1950-1975 remain in print in 2014, and the 50th anniversary commemoration of by George Herring, 1978 the war is an opportune time to recognize the best of them. This book is widely viewed as the besj concise history of the Vietnam War. Her• In the short history of Vietnam War literature, publishers would ring, a former University of Kentucky hardly touch a book on the war until the late 1970s and early 1980s—a history professor, covers virtually every part of the self-induced national amnesia about that conflict and its important event in the conflict, present• outcome. After sufficient time had elapsed to ease some of the war's ing the war objectively and assessing its psychic wounds, we saw a mini explosion of important books. Most legacy. Revised and updated over the of the books on the following, very subjective, list of the top 15 fiction years, America's Longest War is used in and nonfiction titles, came out in the late '70s and throughout the '80s. many college courses on the Vietnam War. Only two were published in the past 15 years. 5 By necessity, compilations of this kind omit worthy titles. Even THE BEST AND THE BRIGHTEST by David Haiberstam, 1972 S so, the books below are the cream of the crop among the thousands Halberstam, who was a Vietnam War s written about America's most controversial overseas war. They are correspondent for The New York Times, S presented randomly within the categories of nonfiction and fiction. produced a deeply researched, clearly and 30 VIETNAM WINNER OF T«E HAIIOMl fiSOK JWP' INC IHtPULITffSPBIZ! David ABRlCiMT oriuiiate Halberstam SHINING UE son I John P%ul\knn and The Best America in Metnam and the NEILSHEEHAN

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engagingly written history of America's in• A BRIGHT SHINING UE: JOHN PAUL or venal men in Washington and Saigon, volvement in the Vietnam War. He focuses VANN AND AMERICA IN VIETNAM and above all the account of the man who on personalities—primarily the "best and by Neil Sheelian, 1988 serves as both its hero and antihero," wrote brightest" of John F. Kennedy's adminis• Former New York Times correspondent historian Ronald Steel, adding, "If there is tration, including Robert McNamara, Walt Neil Sheehan spent 16 years working on a one book that captures the Vietnam War Rostow, McGeorge Bundy, Dean Rusk and magisterial examination of the life of leg• in the sheer Homeric scale of its passion General Maxwell Taylor—and the many endary Army Colonel John Paul Vann and and folly, this book is it." mistakes they made in prosecuting the war. American involvement in Vietnam. A tour In The Best and the Brightest,Haiherstam de force of research, reporting, analysis CHICKENHAWK set out to answer the question, "What and writing, A Bright Shining Lie received by Robert Mason, 1983 was it about the men, their attitudes, the the for nonfiction This is the definitive memoir about the country, its institutions and above all the and the Pulitzer for general nonfiction. helicopter war in Vietnam. Mason's pene• era which had allowed this tragedy to take Sheehan's anger about what happened trating look at his 1965-66 tour as a Huey place?" Halberstam died in an automobile "infuses extraordinary descriptive passages pilot in the 1st Cavalry Division (Airmo• accident in 2007. of battle, the machinations of confused bile) contains reconstructed dialogue. 31 A soldier with the 1st Cavalry Division joined the Marines after graduating from her 1969-70 tour. It is filled with the emo• (Airmobile) runs through a forest of college in 1967 and less than a year later tional turmoil she faced in-country and rubber trees in a March 4,1969, assault was in the thick of the fighting. He stepped after coming home. Van Devanter used an on a Viet Cong bunlcer near Dau Thieng. on a booby trap and lost both legs and experienced co-writer, Christopher Mor• parts of his hands. Puller recovered, went gan, to help tell this strong pro-veteran, which works well in depictions of his to law school, got married and fathered antiwar story. In 1978 Van Devanter started many dangerous missions zooming in two children. This remarkable tale is writ• the Women Veterans Project at Vietnam and out of hot landing zones. There is ten cleanly, intelligently, with insight—and Veterans of America. She died in 2002. very little glamour here: Although Mason without self-pity. Despite the uplifting recounts the tremendous—and at times message of the book, the pains inflicted THEY MARCHED INTO SUNLIGHT: senseless—risks he and his fellow Huey by the war ultimately overwhelmed Puller. WAR AND PEACE, VIETNAM pilots took almost daily, he also describes He committed suicide in 1994. AND AMERICA, OCTOBER 1967 his gradual disillusionment with the war. by David Maraniss, 2003 HOME BEFORE MORNING: They Marched Into Sunlight garnered a FORTUNATE SON: THE STORY OF AN Pulitzer for Maraniss, a former Wash• THE HEALING OF A VIETNAM VET ARMY NURSE IN VIETNAM ington Post journalist. A masterpiece of by Lewis B. Puller Jr., 1991 by Lynda Van Oevariter, 1983 reporting and analysis, the book zeroes The author, a first lieutenant in Vietnam Generally considered the top memoir by in on two noteworthy but previously 2 and son of legendary Marine General a female Vietnam veteran, this brutally underexamined events that occurred 2 Lewis "Chesty" Puller from the World frank book is written with many detailed at the same time in October 1967: the m War II and Korea eras, won a Pulitzer for descriptions of the wounded and dying decimation of a 1st Infantry Division y this memoir. Puller tells his life story in men Van Devanter saw as a nurse at the battalion in South Vietnam and the vi• o a straightforward, introspective style. He 71st Evacuation Hospital in Pleiku during olence on the University of Wisconsin 32 VIETNAM BETTMANN/CORBIS campus during a protest against Dow Light Infantry Brigade. O'Brien was a portraying, as he puts it, "the day-to-day Chemical Co. Maraniss' presentation of sensitive, intelligent, well-read budding life of an infantryman on the ground." The the events in Vietnam and Wisconsin poet-author when he was drafted. He story begins on Sept. 8,1967, as Downs is evenhanded, letting the reader judge struggled mentally before deciding to is flying into Tan Son Nhut and ends on who was right and wrong in both places. submit to the draft, philosophized his Jan. 11,1968, when he stepped on a land way through basic training and survived a mine and was seriously wounded. BLOODS: BLACK VETERANS OF THE sometimes hellish tour of duty. All of what VIETNAM WAR: AN ORAL HISTORY he writes rings true, and the book flows IN PHARAOH'S ARMY: by Wallace Terry, 1984 with the natural chronology of a novel. MEMORIES OF THE LOST WAR Bloods is the preeminent examination of by Tobias Wolff, 1994 African-American troops' experiences in PATCHES OF FIRE: Wolff was an Army Special Forces sergeant Vietnam. Terry, a former Time magazine A STORY OF WAR AND REDEMPTION advising a South Vietnamese battalion in correspondent, presents the war and post• by Albert French, 1997 the Mekong Delta during 1967-68 and war stories of 20 black veterans. Some of French brilliantly illuminates his war and later became an award-winning short- the personal histories are inspirational postwar experiences with insights on the story writer. His noted memoir of his tales from men who overcame powerful nature of the war in Vietnam, the treat• youth, This Boy's Life, was published in odds; others are depressing narratives ment that returning veterans received 1989. In Pharaoh's Army is a memoir of death, disfigurement and disillusion. and the tenaciousness of post-traumatic about his time in Vietnam—a creative, All of them convey, with a strong sense stress disorder. He joined the Marines in entertainingly written book filled with of immediacy, what it was like to be an 1963 and served a battle-heavy tour with brisk, realistic reconstructed dialogue, American fighting in Vietnam. Terry E Company, 2nd Battalion, 7th Marine fascinating characters and enlightened shows that blacks experienced many in• Regiment, until he was severely wounded self-analysis. It also covers Wolff's life stances of discrimination and inequity during the bloody Operation Harvest before he joined the Army, his year of in assignments, medals, promotions and Moon near Chu Lai in December 1965. Vietnamese language training in Wash• other matters. One of the positive things The book "is a classic tale, life-affirming ington and his return home from the war. Bloods brings out, though, is the virtual and updated for the modern age," Ter- absence of racism on the front lines. Terry rance Maitland wrote in the New York A RUMOR OF WAR died in 2003. Times Book Review. by Philip Caputo, 1977 One of the first classic Vietnam War memoirs, A Rumor of War garnered immediate praise for the author, a for• PHILIP CAPUTO'S 4 RUMOR OF WAR mer Marine first lieutenant. "Caputo's WAS ONE OF THE FIRST MEMOIRS OF troubled, searching meditations on the THE VIETNAM WAR TO BECOME A CLASSIC. love and hate of war, on fear, and the ambivalent discord warfare can create in the hearts of decent men, are among the most eloquent I have read in modern lit• IF I DIE IN A COMBAT ZONE: THE KILLING ZONE: erature," noyelist wrote. BOX ME UP AND SHIP ME HOME MY LIFE IN THE VIETNAM WAR Caputo relates his Marine Corps experi• by Tim O'Brien, 1974 by Frederick Downs Jr., 1978 ences from the time he decided to join If I Die in a Combat Zone was one of Downs, who served as an Army lieutenant through his tour of duty, which began the first Vietnam War memoirs released in Vietnam, wrote three memoirs. The in March 1965 when he landed with the by a major publisher. O'Brien impres- Killing Zone, his first, is one of the best of first Marines to fight in Vietnam. The sionistically writes about growing up in the genre. The straightforward, taut prose last part of the book is an account of the Minnesota, getting drafted, going through evokes a clear picture of his 1967-68 tour North Vietnamese takeover in Saigon, infantry training and serving nine months as a 23-year-old platoon leader in the 4th which Caputo covered as a journalist in 1969-70 as a rifleman with the 198th Infantry Division. Downs succeeds well in in April 1975. 33 STREET WITHOUT JOY: FICTION thoughts into a gripping story that unfolds INDOCHINA AT WAR, 1946-54 through flashbacks, soliloquies and con• by Bernard Fail, 1961 CLOSE QUARTERS versations. Brown died in 2004. Fall, who served in World War II with by Larry Heinemann, 1977 the French Resistance and later the Larry Heinemann's autobiographical DOCSOLDIERS •••••••••••• U.S. Army, was widely acknowledged novel is one of the earliest pieces of fic• by , 1974 in the 1950s and '60s as the preeminent tion set in the Vietnam War—and one of This much-admired novel—it received the scholar of the Indochina War that ended the best and most underappreciated. This National Book Award for fiction—features Vietnam's years as a French colony and fast-flowing book tells the story of draftee a plot that revolves around the Vietnam put Communist forces in control of the Philip Dosier, beginning with his induc• War and drug smuggling. One reviewer - country's northern region. He wrote tion. The plot takes Dosier into Vietnam called it a "dark descendant of Conrad's eight highly regarded books about the as the new guy, puts him on an eventful and Hemingway's adventure stories, a tale war before he was killed in Vietnam in tour of duty and then sends him home. of Vietnam and California, a narrative 1967 while riding in a jeep that hit a Close Quarters is filled with what could be meditation on the counter-culture." Stone, land mine. Street Without Joy, arguably his best book, is a history and analysis of the French war and the beginnings of "LYRICAL, ENCHANTED DESCRiPTIONS...ARE A the American war. It contained a warning (unheeded) about what the U.S. military LANTERNED BACKDROP TO A TALE OF IRONY would be facing. The book is "not only AND BETRAYAL" IN THE QUIET AMERICAN. a splendid account of a conflict often forgotten in the aftermath of America's war in Vietnam, but it also speaks to the stock characters—doltish lifer sergeants who served in the Navy during the 1950s, debate that continues to rage among and clueless officers, for example—but focuses the story on Ray Hicks, a sailor on military experts on the nature of the two Heinemann gives them unique personal• the way home from Vietnam, and John wars in Indochina and the proper ways ities in a book of hard, brutal prose that Converse, a hapless . to fight them," wrote George Herring, accurately conveys life in the trenches. The main characters are tortured souls and the author of America's Longest War. Heinemann served in the 25th Infantry all wind up suff'ering severely—mentally, Division fi-om 1967 to '68. physically, or both. WHEN HEAVEN AND EARTH CHANCED PLACES: DIRTY WORK THE QUIET AMERICAN A VIETNAMESE WOMAN'S by Larry Brown, 1988 by Graham Greene, 1955 JOURNEY FROM WAR TO PEACE Dirty Work is a gem of short fiction, stud• Greene's book is widely regarded as a by Le Ly Hayslip, 1989 ded with dialogues and monologues fi'om classic, prophetic literary tale that exam• Le Ly Hayslip opened a new world to two Marines severely wounded in Vietnam. ines the start of American engagement in American readers in this remarkable Brown, who served in the Marine Corps Vietnam. The acclaimed English novelist autobiography. With the help of writer but not in Vietnam, unwinds the action and journalist, who covered the French Jay Wurts, she intimately details the life during one long night of the soul as the war in Vietnam from 1951 to '54, set the of a Vietnamese woman who grew up in two main characters talk with each oflier in book in 1954 Saigon. The quiet Ameri• a peasant family, married an American a veterans hospital. One patient lost both can of the title is Alden Pyle, who tries to and immigrated to the United States. arms and legs in a firefight and has been forge an American solution to the Com• Hayslip provides "a searing and human confined to a hospital bed for 22 years. The munist insurgency. Another character, S account of Vietnam's destruction and other, his face severely disfigured in the war, cynical British journalist Thomas Fowler, JJ^;; self-destruction," former Vietnam War suffers from intermittent seizures from a says of Pyle: "I never knew a man who |. m correspondent David Shipler wrote. "Lu- bullet lodged in his brain. Both charac• had better motives for all the trouble he j cidly, sometimes even lyrically, Ms. Hays- ters are clearly and realistically drawn. caused." In a discussion of the The Quiet Q lip paints an intensely intimate portrait." Brown seamlessly weaves their words and American, essayist Pico Iyer said: "Lyrical, 34 VIETNAM tJAMES WEB AUTHOR Of tOSr SOLDIEOS FIELDS OF FIRE

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enchanted descriptions of rice paddies, out the shocking story of the unidentified of a conventional war tale: An American languorous opium dens and even slightly narrator who goes through a harrowing platoon, with representative members of sinister Buddhist political groups are a tour of duty as a combat medic. Currey different races, ethnicities and sections lanterned backdrop to a tale of irony and skillfully reveals this everyman soldier's of the country, undergoes a hellacious betrayal." Greene died in 1991. varied and extreme feelings. He helps time in the war zone. But Webb tells the readers understand what it was like to go story without resorting to cliches, and FATAL LIGHT to war in Vietnam, feel the heat physically his powerful'writing clearly shows what by Richard Currey, 1988 and mentally, and then come home and the war was like for those in the bush. This one-of-a-kind Vietnam tale, the try to make sense of what happened. "In swift, flexible prose that does every• first novel of a former Navy corpsman, thing he asks of it," Newsweek magazine reads like a series of connected, finely FIELDS OF FIRE stated. "Webb gives us an extraordinary written short stories. Dozens of very by James Webb, 1978 range of acutely observed people, not one short chapters are presented in a jumpy, In his first novel Webb, a former Marine a stereotype, and as many different ways fragmented, staccato rhythm. In this way, first lieutenant and later U.S. senator, of looking at that miserable war. Fields Currey convincingly and stylishly spills developed a plot that follows the outline of Fire is a stunner." 35 Uncle Emmett, a laconic Vietnam veteran THE THINGS THEY CARRIED • • • • by Tim O'Brien, 1978 suffering from Agent Orange exposure by Tim O'Brien, 1990 O'Brien's ambitious first novel, a Na• and post-traumatic stress disorder. She is This may be the biggest-selling, most tional Book Award winner, is a journey of haunted by visions of her father, who was widely read book of Vietnam War fiction. magical realism seen through the eyes of killed in tiie war before she was bom. Oflier It has become a fixture in high school and draftee Paul Berlin. Private Cacciato, an important characters are Emmett's friends, college English classes. The interlinked off-kilter member of his company, decides a group of veterans who hang out at Mc• short stories feature a protagonist named to leave Vietnam and walk to Paris. The Donald's and a local bar. The Vietnam War Tim O'Brien, looking back on his life in the platoon follows him. O'Brien "opened a door for the rest of us to walk through by illustrating how it was possible to tell THE SHORT-TIMERS, BY GUSTAV HASFORD, deeper truths about war and war's horri• ble and lasting consequences by allowing WAS THE INSPIRATION FOR THE STANLEY the imagination the power to construct KUBRICK MOVIE , the dynamics of the story and to fill in the gaps of memory," wrote poet and Vietnam veteran Bruce Weigl. is at the heart of In Country, but another war after coming home and meditating on story is entwined: Sam's battle against the what it all means. The book is filled with PACO'S STORY demons of adolescence. The spare writing, clever plots and memorable characters. It by Larry Heinemann, 1987 which relies heavily on dialogue, brings life also offers brilliant discourses on life, death, Heinemann's second literary work, Paco's to the characters. Mason's choice of the truth, fiction and the nature of war stories. Story, a biting tale of the Vietnam War's war as her novel's centerpiece is a crucial emotional aftermath, won the National element in the book's success. THE SHORT-TIMERS Book Award for fiction. Heinemann bores byGustav Hasford, 1979 into the mind of the book's antihero, MATTERHORN Best known as the book that spawned Paco Sullivan, as he struggles with his by Karl Marlantes, 2010 director 's film Full Metal personal demons after duty in Vietnam Marlantes, who commanded a 3rd Marine Jacket, Hasford's The Short-Timers is a left him severely wounded—and the Division rifle platoon in Vietnam, spent semiautobiographical tale dealing with lone survivor in his unit. "Heinemann's three decades working on Matterhorn, Private Joker (James Davis, age 19, from brilliance is that whenever Paco's world his first novel. In this semiautobiograph- rural Alabama), a colorful iconoclastic trails into the maudlin, he flings us back ical book, a young Ivy League-educated Marine combat correspondent in Vietnam to Vietnam, the firefight that killed all of lieutenant named Mellas is enmeshed in at the height of the war. "Nothing I've read Paco's platoon, the months in the hos• sustained, bloody fighting in Vietnam that tried to convey the monstrousness pital on various pain-killing drugs," one during 1969. Matterhorn focuses on a of that grave-maker known as the war in reviewer wrote, "and the anodyne of the company of Marines and a seemingly Viet Nam even remotely approaches the present becomes justified, and realistic, never-ending succession of battles pri• eloquence of The Short-Timers," wrote and the story of one forgotten, generic marily in and around the mountaintop critic and novelist Harlan Ellison. "It is GI in [a] non-descript town...becomes base that gives the book its incongruous one of the most amazing stretches of part of the local lore." title. The action scenes evoke Vietnam writing I've ever encountered." War combat at its most intense—and its IN COUNTRY most horrible. Writer Sebastian Junger, THE PHANTOM BLOOPER by Bobbie Arm Mason, 1985 who has reported on the war in Afghan• by Custav Hasford, 1990 S This first novel by Mason is one of the istan, called the book "one of the most Hasford, who worked as a combat cor• strongest literary treatments of the leg- profound and devastating novels ever to respondent for publications serving the I acy of the Vietnam W^r. Sam Hughes, a come out of Vietnam—or any war. It's military, realistically depicts a hellish, 17-year-old girl who lives in a small western not a book so much as a deployment, and atrocity-filled war in this Marine tough- a Kentucky town in 1984, shares a house with you will not return unaltered." guy novel. Its central character is Private 36 VIETNAM Joker, the eternally disaffected Marine off-the-wall characters who work in the A soldier in Operation Wallowa near Tarn brought to literary life by Hasford in 1069th Military Intelligence Group. The Ky on Nov. 1,1967, has a heavy load to The Short-Timers. The Phantom Blooper spotlight, however, is on Spc. 4 James Grif• bear as he leads a squad from the 3rd begins with Joker trying to stay safe and fin. What happens to the men in Vietnam Brigade, 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile). sane during the final days of the siege of drives most of them, including Griffin, to Khe Sanh. Joker tries to go one-on-one the edge of insanity. Once Griffin comes told in the voice of a different Vietnamese with the Phantom Blooper, someone who home, his emotional problems intensify. expatriate living in southern Louisiana. has been killing men in his unit and may Meditations in Green received high critical "Robert Olen Butler has written an ex• even be an American working for the praise, along with the Maxwell Perkins traordinary book," novelist James Lee enemy. Then comes the story of Joker's Prize for promising first novels. One critic Burke wrote. "He has managed to depict captivity by Viet Cong villagers. Hasford called it a "brilliant and scarifying," novel, both Vietnam and Louisiana simulta• offers an uncommonly sharp picture of "lurid, extravagant, rhapsodic and horrific neously in stories that have the delicate life among the Viet Cong, the North Viet• by turns—sometimes all at once." and graceful quality of tropical flowers." namese Army and the Vietnamese people in general. Hasford died in 1993. A GOOD SCENT FROM A STRANGE MOUNTAIN Marc Leepson has been reviewing MEDITATIONS IN GREEN by Robert Oien Butler, 1992 Vietnam War books since the late 1970s by Stephen Wright, 1983 Butler served in Saigon from 1969 to '71 for newspapers and magazines, including Wright's book is based—^very loosely—on as a Vietnamese-speaking Army intelli• Vietnam. His column on books has his experiences as a drafted Army intelli• gence specialist. Today he is one of the appeared in The WA Veteran, the gence analyst who speciahzed in working nation's most honored literary novelists magazine published by Vietnam Veterans with aerial photographs during his 1969- and short story writers. He received uni• of America, since 1986. He served with the 70 tour in Vietnam. It shifts back and form accolades—and a Pulitzer—for this Army's 527th Personnel Service Company forth in time to tell the war stories of collection of linked short stories, each in QuiNhon, Vietnam, 1967-68. 37