Synopsis
This novel is set in the very center of the time of most difficult combat experienced by a United States Marine Corps rifle company. A second lieutenant, only days from training back in the states is ordered, under fire, to assume command of a company of cast off Marines, all out in the brutal bloody jungle because of the either the worst of luck or the most minor of offenses or infringement. The outnumbered and little supported company is at constant war with vicious units of the North Vietnamese Army while at the same time tearing itself apart every night in deadly encounters between its racially mixed elements. The enlisted ranks lack all respect for their untested and inexperienced officers, while the officers fight them right back using supporting fires on the enemy as well as their own warring factions. All the men are ruled by terror and fear of the end they know they are not likely to avoid. They are not going home. They are not going to the rear area. And they are only to be kept moving through a valley of death called the A Shau, with only the manner of their passing in question. That same company so riven by internal strife, however, remains frightfully effective in fighting the enemy. This account of the reality of agonizingly brutal guerrilla combat is written from the perspective of the new lieutenant who sends his last will and testament home to his wife after only three days in combat.
About the Author
From a traveled elementary school education, changing schools ever two years, to attending a small liberal arts college, James Strauss graduated to a leadership position that turned out to be a 'hanging by the fingernails' survival position in the Marines Corps in the Vietnam War, 1969. From a hospital bed, when he finally found it was likely he would live, and looked up and asked God for one favor. James asked not to lead a normal humdrum life. He now believes that God heard his prayer and pointed one finger down to grant his request. Outrageous fortune was smiled down upon him with all of its travel, pain,depression, elation, danger, adventure and total lack of believability. For a time James tried to have credibility until he discovered that his own credibility was "without meaning". James has published four novels: The Boy, The Bering Sea, The Warrior, and Down in the Valley. He is currently readying another Arch Patton Saga, It Was 1993, and an accounting of his Vietnam War Experience, 30 Days Has September, along with publishing a weekly Midwestern Newspaper, The Geneva Shore Report
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