- Paperback: 624 pages
- Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin; First Edition edition (Feb 15 1999)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0312200811
- ISBN-13: 978-0312200817
- Product Dimensions: 22.9 x 15.5 x 4.1 cm
- Shipping Weight: 726 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (40 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #554,183 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
Review
"There have been a number of excellent books about Vietnam. . .but none has managed to communicate in such detail the day-to-day pain, discomfort, frustration and exhilaration of the American military experience in Vietnam." --Joe Klein, The New York Times Book Review
"The novel about the Vietnam War. . .Del Vecchio has constructed a classic war novel, a complex and frightening book, that gets it right." --Chicago Sun Times
"An important and distinctly American book." --William Plummer, Newsweek
"The novel about the Vietnam War. . .Del Vecchio has constructed a classic war novel, a complex and frightening book, that gets it right." --Chicago Sun Times
"An important and distinctly American book." --William Plummer, Newsweek
Book Description
A work that has served as a literary cornerstone for the Vietnam generation, The 13th Valley follows the strange and terrifying Vietnam combat experiences of James Chelini, a telephone-systems installer who finds himself an infantryman in territory controlled by the North Vietnamese Army. Spiraling deeper and deeper into a world of conflict and darkness, this harrowing account of Chelini's plunge and immersion into jungle warfare traces his evolution from a semipacifist to an all-out warmonger.
The seminal novel on the Vietnam experience, The 13th Valley is a classic that illuminates the war in Southeast Asia like no other book.
The seminal novel on the Vietnam experience, The 13th Valley is a classic that illuminates the war in Southeast Asia like no other book.
Inside This Book
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First Sentence
From that day on they called him Cherry and from the night of that day and on he thought of himself as Cherry. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
From that day on they called him Cherry and from the night of that day and on he thought of himself as Cherry. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
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Customer Reviews
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Most helpful customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Reviewer from Seattle Misguided,
By A Customer
This review is from: The 13th Valley (Paperback)
The reviewer from Seattle is not sufficiently far from the cradle to know that many adolescents served in ground combat during the Vietnam War. So many American mothers' teenaged sons were, in fact, killed in Vietnam, and such was the outcry, that the US Marines were eventually not permitted to accept a 17 year-old recruit without the signatures of both parents.Mr. Del Vecchio did Americans a good service by putting the horror and heartbreak of his war to the printed word for all of us to examine. Del Vecchio's follow-up to 13th Valley, Carry Me Home, proves only too well that his personal experiences were, also, all too real.
5.0 out of 5 stars
THIS NOVEL WILL HIT YOU LIKE AN RPG!,
By
This review is from: The 13th Valley (Paperback)
The author unabashedly states in his "Author's Note" that Vietnam was "the most moral war this nation has ever engaged." There are merits to that view in spite of "those in the media, in the arts, and in education who continue to perpetrate the cliches" (p. xi). This is not the venue for a debate on that topic, but if you read this book, you will understand the camaraderie and heroism of the men who heeded their country's call and fought there. The novel chronicles thirteen days of Company A, 7th Battalion, 402nd Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division. As you hump with the boonierats, you will come to understand the psychology of survival that men like Egan, Cherry, Doc, Jax, and Lt. Brooks employ to keep from going insane: "Don't mean nothin. Drive on." The author's turbo-charged prose plants you right there in the Khe Ta Laou Valley up in I Corps. You feel the elephant grass slice your hands as you move into the valley. If you read before bed, you may wake up in the middle of the night imagining that you're being attacked by insatiable blood-sucking leeches crawling into your poncho. The descriptive language alone is a tour de force, while the characters seem so real they materialize before you as you read. The maps help you keep track of unit positions and movements, and the "Activity Reports" at the end of some chapters aptly summarize the military activity of each day in the valley. I just finished reading this novel today, and already I'm going back and re-reading certain passages that I liked. This is the way Vietnam was. The language of the grunts is authentic. I know. I was there during the time frame within which the story takes place. You can go there, too, if you read this novel. In the beginning chapter, Cherry asks a clerk, "Oh-deuce?" The clerk responds, "Yeah, Man. Oh-deuce. Four-oh-deuce. That's where you goin, cherry. That's where you goin." I challenge you to follow along.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Harrowing, gripping, beautiful, heartbreaking,
By A Customer
This review is from: The 13th Valley (Paperback)
A blurb on the book compares it to Mailer's NAKED AND THE DEAD, and that comparison is right on. Very detailed and engrossing alongside the ruminations on war and human character. An understatement, however, to say I was disappointed when the author refers to the Vietnam War as "...the most moral war this nation has ever engaged." To bring honor to the men who fought and died does not require this kind of statement. Del Vecchio's story, by focusing on those troops directly engaged with enemy forces in hostile territory and not those operating in civilian-occupied areas, can avoid the worst aspects of US operations and their effect on the Vietnamese. Civilians continue to be killed by left behind ordnance and agent orange. Americans nonetheless receive a kind welcome as visitors to Vietnam today (not to mention the welcome given to companies like Nike). And it's important to remember that the atrocities of Pol Pot in neighboring Cambodia were only ended by a Vietnamese invasion (Del Vecchio remarks in his prologue that we need war to deter tyrants like Pol Pot). The War itself was denounced by its main architect, Sec't of State McNamara, when he announced "we were wrong, terribly wrong." For many reasons, therefore, I'm confused by his statement. If that was the "most moral war" I fear for humankind.
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