A Rumor of War: The Classic Vietnam Memoir (40th Anniversary Edition)

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Picador, 2017 - Biography & Autobiography - 384 pages

The 40th anniversary edition of the classic Vietnam memoir—featured in the PBS documentary series The Vietnam War by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick—with a new foreword by Kevin Powers

In March of 1965, Lieutenant Philip J. Caputo landed at Danang with the first ground combat unit deployed to Vietnam. Sixteen months later, having served on the line in one of modern history’s ugliest wars, he returned home—physically whole but emotionally wasted, his youthful idealism forever gone.

A Rumor of War is far more than one soldier’s story. Upon its publication in 1977, it shattered America’s indifference to the fate of the men sent to fight in the jungles of Vietnam. In the years since then, it has become not only a basic text on the Vietnam War but also a renowned classic in the literature of wars throughout history and, as the author writes, of "the things men do in war and the things war does to them."

"Heartbreaking, terrifying, and enraging. It belongs to the literature of men at war." —Los Angeles Times Book Review

 

Contents

The Splendid Little War
1
The Officer In Charge Of The Dead
151
In Deaths Grey Land
209
Epilogue
336
Copyright

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About the author (2017)

Philip Caputo was born on June 10, 1941 in Chicago, Illinois. He received a B.A. from Loyola University in 1964. He served in the U.S. Marine Corps from 1964 to 1967. His first book, A Rumor of War (1977), recounts his military tour of Vietnam. He has written more than fifteen books including Horn of Africa, Indian Country, Equation for Evil, Crossers, and The Longest Road. His journalism career began in 1968, when he joined the staff of the Chicago Tribune, serving as a general assignment and team investigative reporter until 1972 and then as a foreign correspondent for the next five years. In 1972 he and Hugh Jones received a Pulitzer Prize for their coverage of election fraud in the primaries. He has also written for the New York Times, Washington Post, the Boston Globe, the Los Angeles Times, and many other publications. He has worked as a screenwriter for Paramount Pictures and Michael Douglas Productions.

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