Vietnam #5: Walking Wounded

by Chris Lynch

Overview

"The best Vietnam War novels yet for this age range." - KIRKUS REVIEWS

Morris, Rudi, Ivan, and Beck were best friends. So when one of them was drafted into the Vietnam War, the others signed up, too. They promised to watch out for one another. They pledged to come home together.

Now, that pledge has been broken. One of the four has been killed in action. And the remaining three are the only men alive who know the awful truth about their friend's death.

Each is left to deal with their secret in his own way. One of them will accompany his friend's body home to Boston. One of them will defy orders in an act of protest. And one of them will decide it's up to him to single-handedly win the war.

In the end, Vietnam may claim more than their lives. As the war grinds on, their very souls are at stake. And their shattered friendship will prove either their salvation . . . or their ruin.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780545640138
Publisher:	Scholastic, Inc.
Publication date:	10/21/2014
Series:	Vietnam , #5
Pages:	208
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.30(h) x 1.00(d)
Lexile:	930L (what's this?)
Age Range:	10 - 14 Years

About the Author

Chris Lynch is the author of numerous acclaimed books for middle-grade and teen readers, including the Vietnam and World War II series and the National Book Award finalist INEXCUSABLE. He teaches in the Lesley University creative writing MFA program, and divides his time between Massachusetts and Scotland.

Editorial Reviews

Praise for Chris Lynch's VIETNAM:

"The best Vietnam War novels yet for this age range." - KIRKUS REVIEWS

"Lynch brilliantly captures the war in small details." - BOOKLIST

"So vivid, the reader will feel the stickiness of the heat and . . . hear the buzzing of mosquitoes." - VOICE OF YOUTH ADVOCATES

"A fine balance of thoughtfulness and gritty action." - BULLETIN OF THE CENTER FOR CHILDREN'S BOOKS

"Lynch delivers an action-packed examination of the bonds and trials of friendship." - SCHOOL LIBRARY JOURNAL

"It makes you wonder how you would have acted in those situations. . . . Recommended." - LIBRARY MEDIA CONNECTION

From the Publisher

2014-07-29
The fifth installment in Lynch's Vietnam series continues the story of four friends who entered the war together and have now been forever changed by it. Though Volume 4, Casualties of War (2013), seemed to have concluded the series, Lynch again takes readers into the minds and souls of Morris, Rudi, Beck and Ivan. Once Rudi was drafted, it was Morris' idea that the four friends would go to Vietnam together, each in a different branch of the service, and somehow keep an eye on one another. Now Rudi has been killed, and Morris goes home as his body escort. Morris feels guilty for forcing everyone into this, and now he's trying to discern meaning from their experience of death in a war they never really understood. This volume continues the first-person narratives in the voices of the four friends, even Rudi's, though now his is a ghostly voice, a questionable contrivance at first but one that ultimately make sense in the overall arc of the story; each of the characters is haunted, and the only meaning they can make is that "You don't have to believe in the war, to believe in the guys." If there's not a tidy conclusion, it's because the fate of the walking wounded is inscrutable. A powerful antidote to those who would glorify war. (Historical fiction. 10-14)

Kirkus Reviews