NCW Libraries

The story of a platoon of Marines fighting in Vietnam evokes the ambiguous and gruesome character of the war and contrasts man's realization of war's dangers with his attraction to war as the ultimate test of survival.

Nothing could have prepared privileged-boy Jack McLean for the horror of Landing Zone Loon--a three-day battle that took place on a remote hill tucked into the border of North Vietnam and Laos in June 1968, killing twenty-seven men, wound nearly one hundred others, and leave several dozen survivors to defend an ever-shrinking perimeter with little water or ammo. A powerful coming-of-age portrait that defines some of the most tumultuous events in our...

During his second tour as a US Army infantryman in the Vietnam War, John Burnam became a scout-dog handler. On combat missions, he learned of the dogs amazing ability to find enemy caches of ammunition and supplies, hidden base camps, and concealed tunnel entrances; saving countless lives by enabling American troops to avoid booby traps and ambushes. After retirement from the military, he became passionate about the idea of a national monument to...

The author takes as his canvas the Vietnam War, as seen through a single mission that occurred on May 2, 1968. A twelve-man Special Forces team had been covertly inserted into a small clearing in the jungle of neutral Cambodia--where U.S. forces were forbidden to operate. The team did not know they had infiltrated a section of jungle that concealed a major enemy base.

"James Webb, author of Fields of Fire, the classic novel of the Vietnam War--former U.S. Senator; Secretary of the Navy; recipient of the Navy Cross, Silver Star and Purple Heart as a combat Marine; and a self-described 'military brat'--has written an extraordinary memoir of his early years, 'a love story--love of family, love of country, love of service,' in his words. Webb's mother grew up in the poverty-stricken cotton fields of eastern Arkansas....