As a longtime Bruce Golden fan, I coudn't wait to read his newest work. A departure from his usual sci-fi genre, this book is based on his experiences in the U.S. Army while stationed in South Korea during the Vietnam War. Bitingly satirical and outrageously humorous, poignant and heartfelt, it skillfully encapsulates this tumultuous era in American history. Though the subject matter will obviously appeal to veterans who served during that era, all veterans, active military, and virtually anyone who lived through the '60s and '70s will be entertained and moved by the story. I believe it also has a lot to offer Gen X, Millenial, and Gen Z readers, for both the history lessons and the social commentary. As always, Golden's quirky characters are perfectly fleshed out and and the dialog is flawlessly realistic. I highly recommend this book to everyone. Once you start, you won't be able to put it down.
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The Tower Jockeys
Bruce Golden, author
Part satire, part memoir, The Tower Jockeys is both hilarious and heartbreaking. Full of political and pop culture references from the early '70s, it tells the story of the last American military draftees and how they became part of the U.S. Army's most infamous and uproarious unit while guarding nuclear missiles in the Republic of South Korea. Come for the sardonic tower jockeys, stay for the sabotaged missile, the Bravo missions, the court martial, the tower ghost, the great raid, and the Korean businesswomen who loved them . . . or at least were fond of hitching a ride to America.
Based on actual events, this narrative will take you back to a time when young men feared being drafted into the military and sent halfway around the world to die in a war they didn't necessarily agree with or even understand, and introduces you to a group who avoided that fate, but ended up mired in soul-wrenching tedium and military inanity.
As one of the members of this company says, "It wasn't long before I realized my fellow tower jockeys were more the always scheming fuck-ups of McHale's Navy than the fighting men of Combat. Or, to use one of Pretty Boy's cinematic analogies, think Kelly's Heroes not The Green Berets."
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