The Intruders - Softcover

Coonts, Stephen

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1476746494 ISBN 13: 9781476746494

Publisher: Gallery Books, 2013

Synopsis

From New York Times bestseller Stephen Coonts comes the second novel in his Jake Grafton series.

1973. The skies over Vietnam have finally gone silent. America has pulled out, the war is over. But for Lieutenant Jake Grafton, USN, fresh from two combat cruises and a harrowing shoot-down over Laos, the personal battle is just beginning...His country has not welcomed him home with open arms, but with closed minds and closed fists. When his girlfriend's father called him a murderer, Jake walked away. But when a stranger in a bar challenged his honor, the man was not so lucky - the guy landed in the hospital. Jake landed in jail. And Grafton's shore-duty commander, who bailed him out, has devised the perfect punishment for his ace flight instructor: an eight-month cruise on the aircraft carrier Columbia teaching jarheads—Marines—the nuances of carrier aviation. Flying missions over Vietnam was a living hell; now, as a Navy man working side by side with Marines who have no carrier aviation experience, Grafton's about to discover another world of fresh hell. The Marines may be made of tempered steel and brass balls, but taking off and landing from a slippery flight deck, on a choppy sea in a pitch-black night, there is no margin for error - or for animosity. And men like Marine Captain Flap Le Beau, his bombardier and navigator, have a real gift for pushing Jake's buttons. But he's going to have to learn to live with him...or die trying. They belong to the same society of warriors, they fought in the same war, they drink the same whiskey to toast fallen comrades. Now they must fly together in the same cockpit, must lock into each other and into their million-dollar machine, and make the split-second decisions which will insure that, tonight, their fellow pilots won't raise a glass to them.

About this title

About the Author:

Stephen Coonts is the author of innumerable New York Times bestsellers, the first of which was the classic flying tale, Flight of the Intruder. Coonts grew up in the coal-mining town of Buckhannon, West Virginia, and served as a pilot in the Navy. He still enjoys flying and tries to do as much of it as possible. Find out more at Coonts.com.

From Kirkus Reviews:

Picking up where they left off in Flight of the Intruder (1986), Coonts and his inimitable Navy flyboy, Lt. Jake Grafton, coast on autopilot in this turgid novel of stick-and-rudder derring-do. Long on jargon, acronyms, and technical descriptions but short on actual storytelling, the saga begins in the days following the 1973 US pullback from Vietnam. On leave, Jake pays a visit to best gal Callie McKenzie's home. Callie's pop, a station wagon liberal embittered by the crippling injuries sustained in battle by his son, Theron, has a heated debate with the usually dovish Jake, precipitating an angry flight to a local watering hole. A few glasses later, Jake overhears a drunk taunting a crippled vet and launches the loudmouth through a window. To escape legal reprisal, our hero gladly accepts his first peacetime assignment: instructing Marine pilots in the manly art of carrier-based flying aboard the USS Columbia. Here's where the eponymous A-6 Intruder attack aircraft comes in, and any semblance of plot departs. Sure, there are many new characters: Hugh Skidmore, aka The Real McCoy, a sassy Navy instructor who plays the stock market; Jake's navigator, ``Flap'' LeBeau, a wisdom-spouting Afro-American Marine; and other types running the gamut from fun-loving to psychotic. But action mainly consists of A-6 crews endlessly executing noncombat maneuvers at sea. A difficult task to be sure, but not interesting enough to hold together a novel. In fact, with the exception of a running subplot featuring a ``line-in-the-sand'' conflict with the nearby Soviet fleet and Jake and Flap's bold escape from gunrunners near the story's end, Coonts's narrative style very closely resembles a commander's log--sans command. Those hale enough to finish this muddled flight manual cum novel in one sitting will likely possess enough knowledge about the A-6 to fly one in their sleep. A good thing, since the book certainly won't keep them awake. (First printing of 225,000; author tour) -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

About this edition

• Publisher: Gallery Books
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 1476746494
• ISBN 13: 9781476746494
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 352