Why Read "The Spire"? It's Pointless...

The Spire by Richard North Patterson

Sixteen years ago as a senior (and one of the B-est of MOCs) at Caldwell University, Mark Darrow stumbled off fraternity row early one Sunday morning, only to find the body of a young African-American classmate lying in the shadow of Caldwell's iconic landmark, The Spire. The uproar over the death of one of the school's few minority students (not to mention a beautiful young woman) and the conviction of a second student - one of Darrow's closest friends - knocked the legs out from under the tiny college's fundraising efforts, and it'd been downhill ever since. Darrow's career, on the other hand, had moved in the opposite direction: after Yale Law, his rise in the ranks of attorneys was positively meteoric until, at forty, the handsome young man was a millionaire many times over. That's when his Caldwell mentor and the closest thing to a father he'd ever had, Lionel Farr, came calling in his Beantown highrise office with a proposition. Since the current president of Caldwell had just been caught with his hand in the till (to the tune of $900K), would Darrow please quit his law practice and take over for him?

Well, of course he would...

Back in Wayne, Ohio (home of Caldwell), Darrow found his alma mater clearly on the skids, with morale among both alumni and faculty tanked. Since that long-ago murder started Caldwell on a long, slow decline, Darrow found the case weighed heavily on his mind. Though snowed under with his presidential duties , Darrow nonetheless found time to investigate Angela Hall's murder - especially when he realized that, in hindsight, some things had never added up. To make his nights even shorter, Darrow also embarked on a personal investigation of the alleged embezzlement by his predecessor. Juggling not just a job and a new-found "hobby" would be plenty for a normal man, but Mark Darrow's not your ordinary man: there was also a certain young woman he hadn't seen in sixteen years.

Did the wrong man go to jail for life? Where's the missing money (and who made it go missing)? Could Mark Darrow turn Caldwell around in spite of having zero experience running a university? Would the young widower's broken heart be mended by a raven-haired beauty? All the answers will be found near the center of the Caldwell campus, at The Spire.

Richard North Patterson's seventeenth novel (and second for 2009), The Spire isn't a novel of political intrigue (The Race or Balance of Power), nor is it a courtroom drama (Dark Lady), nor an "issue" piece like Exile or Eclipse): Patterson has written what may well be the first (and very likely the last) mystery with a university president as protagonist. In creating his fictitious Caldwell, Patterson draws heavily on his undergrad days at Ohio Wesleyan University, though the real place seems to have no "spire" at the center of campus - that would be the University of Texas...

Although the plot of a white-shoe Boston attorney turned university president trying to solve two different crimes (one more than a decade old) bears no resemblance to anything else in Patterson's oeuvre, the novel remains immediately recognizable as his work. As in both Exile and Eclipse, the protagonist is a single male legal eagle called to help an important person from his past; about to re-encounter a woman he'd left behind. 

Some might think that the dynamics of small-town race relations and the friction between "town and gown" in small university towns are issue enough for Patterson in The Spire, though I would disagree. Neither such stress is covered in any particular detail, and race relations are actually glossed over except to say that "some people were racist back in the old days." In the absence of a great question to discuss and about which his characters might wax philosophical (endlessly...), Patterson's latest is decidedly smaller that most of his recent works. It's not much smaller physically, but it's smaller intellectually. Where protagonists in his "large-scale" novels are world-class experts working at the leading edges of their vocation (the law), Darrow seems somehow able to have leapt into an entirely new job and still have time to investigate not one but two crimes - and have hot monkey sex with a beautiful woman in his day. Oh, to be young again, eh? Or perhaps it's the Perry Mason effect - lawyers are all supernatural beings.

Besides a plodding and pedestrian plot, The Spire also suffers from a surfeit of transparency. That both of Darrow's investigations would result in miscarriages of justice uncovered was, per convention, a given from page one. What is worse, however, is that the true villain of the piece, regardless of Patterson's clumsy attempts at misdirection, is as obvious as an NBA center amongst a tribe of pygmies. What a generous reviewer might call a "huge plot twist" came as no surprise whatsoever for this reader. Last, Patterson never laid any groundwork for Darrow's decision to leave a highly lucrative legal career and become president of a tiny college - while barely in his forties. Such shortcomings do precious little to recommend The Spire as a mystery/thriller novel - and I don't recommend it, either.

Running Loose: A Challenge to Bluenoses Everywhere

Running Loose by Chris Crutcher

I don't know about the rest of the guys out there, but if my senior year in high school had started out like Louie Banks', did, I'd have been one happy camper. Louie was a certified Big Man on Campus at THS – Trout (Idaho) High School – he had a starting slot on the football team, a better-'n-average GPA, and a cheerleader for a girlfriend. Maybe he was a big frog in a very small pond, but it sure seemed that Louie had it all. But that was before Coach Lednecky put a contract out on an opposing quarterback and called him some pretty unattractive names, starting with mild racial slurs and ending with the N-word. When Louie decided to stand on principle, Coach denied everything and almost the whole town turned against one confused seventeen-year-old.

Everybody, that is, except his best friend Carter, his parents Norm and Brenda, and Becky. Beautiful, smart, sexy Becky…

I don't know about the rest of the guys out there, but if my senior year in high school had turned out the way Louie's did, I might not have made it. It's a testament to a strong, levelheaded young man who'd been well prepared by loving parents that he made it through the trials and tribulations heaped on his head over those nine short months. It's even more astounding that he came through more grown up than he'd ever imagined. Dear Abby used to say, "If life gives you lemons, make lemonade." Louie Banks would definitely have had enough lemonade to keep Trout, Idaho, from getting thirsty for a long time. Here's to Louie, Running Loose on the back roads of western Idaho.

Like most Chris Crutcher books, Running Loose is written for adolescent males; guys who can identify with what Louie goes through every day at school (and what he does every night under the covers). It's a coming-of-age story in the sense that every seventeen-year-old has to come of age; but it's also a coming of age tale in the sense that Louie Banks does more growing up in that short year than a lot of "adults" have gotten around to doing by the time they're thirty.

Sure, the story is simplistic – it has to be, because people don't write another Ulysses for YA fiction. The idea is to entertain, to give the reader something he can identify with, and get across a hidden message or two. The twin messages in Running Loose are pretty powerful: a stand on principle is position of strength, and one must always roll with the punches. Louie Banks may shoot himself in the foot from time to time – he is, after all, only seventeen and therefore only about 10% as smart as he thinks he is – but when push comes to shove he makes some decisions that his parents can be proud of.

The odd thing about that last sentence is that there are parents out there who apparently would not be proud of their kids for acting like Louie Banks. Like many of Crutcher's books (Chinese Handcuffs, Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes, Athletic Shorts, and Ironman), Running Loose is a banned book. It's been challenged dozens of times over the years, not long ago (August, 2006) in Rochester, New York. According to the mother of a child given this book on a summer reading list, Running Loose is "soft-core pornography." She was described in a local newspaper as, "so upset by the book's use of racial terms and sexual references that she believed her son could gain little by reading the literature." Her husband said, "Some of the things in the book are unbelievable, and I was extremely surprised."

They must not have read the same book I did: here are just some of the lessons Louie Banks could teach the children of this couple:

1) Take a stand against intolerance and racism.
2) You do not need to have sex to prove you are in love.
3) Not every authority figure is a fit role model.

Soft-core pornography? Excuse me? The kid uses the words "hell" and "bastard" a couple of times. He does make not-infrequent references to, shall we say, the practice of self-gratification, but he gratifies himself, and his girlfriend's not involved.

Here is what is really wrong with the book, things that the couple from Rochester clearly want the libraries and schools to keep out of the sight and mind of their child: Louie calls his parents by their first names. He spends a (sexless) night with his girlfriend. Instead of the minister, the high school football coach, and the high school principal, some of the best advice Louie gets from adults comes from a bar owner and even the town drunk. And, worst of all, Louie blames an unfeeling God for some of the worst things that happen to him. Something tells me that those are the only passages that those Rochester parents ever read…

Find Running Loose at eBay

The Siege: Stephen White Makes You Forget All About Alan Gregory!

The Siege - Stephen White

Along about April every year, things start heating up on the Ivy League campuses. Perhaps it's because the end of the school year is imminent; perhaps it’s the sap rising in hormonal student bodies. Whatever the case, Yale is no different – perhaps even more loony than others, since April is when the societies “tap” new members. Societies like Skull & Bones, Book & Snake, Scroll & Key may sound like the houses of Hogwarts; but they’re real: several Presidents have been members (as have a few cartoonists…). So when things at the “tomb” of Book & Snake start getting strange one April Friday, the campus cops write it off as tap-week festivities.

Things had already started, though: Ann Summers Calderón found the cryptic note in her purse during the week, the one that warned her that something was about to happen and that she was not to tell anyone. But she does: she tells Sam Purdy… That’s why Sam is there for the opening salvo. At the start, it looks like another student prank; a good one – one that might go down in history. The thing about “orange for my disappointment, blue for my contentment” just smacks so much of a prank, especially since blue is Bulldog holy colors and orange belongs to detested Princeton. It looks like a prank when the first student to appear on the steps of Book & Snake shows the little black box taped to his belly, the one with the cartoonish label saying “bomb.” It looks like a harmless prank right up until the moment the bomb blows the hapless teen to bits – and whoever's inside the near-impregnable tomb of Book & Snake still has seventeen more just like him inside…

Yale’s an elite school, and the “taps” are supposedly the elite of the Yalies – the ones inside Book & Snake include children of captains of industry, of a Supreme Court justice nominee, of the Secretary of Defense… and of Ann Summers Calderón. With “assets” like them in danger, the FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team is in town on the double – along with a host of other alphabet agencies; not one of whom has the slightest idea who’s in there, how many are in there, and – most important – why they’re in there. Disgraced Boulder cop Sam Purdy is in town as Ann Calderón’s eyes and ears, and that’s how he meets Poe – Chrisopher Poe, the FBI antiterrorism version of Fox Mulder – and Dee, wunderkind CIA counterterrorism analyst. Good thing: ‘cause whoever’s inside that tomb and whatever’s on their minds, there’s plenty of terror to go around…

There are suspense novels, and there are suspenseful novels – and then there’s Stephen White’s The Siege. This, my friends, is a suspense thriller in the classic tradition, written by a man who knows how to trip all your psychological switches: White is, after all, a clinical psychologist. His tale opens on a sunny day marked only by the vaguest sense of uneasiness, but by the time it finishes two days later, you’re bordering on cardiac arrest from the tension. It is a book of which I happily say something I very rarely say: you’d better block out a long weekend to read The Siege in one sitting, because you will not want to put it down. It is that good. One reason it’s that good is that Stephen White has written a hostage novel in which the readers, like the horde of cops and FBI agents that surround the nearly impregnable building, have absolutely no idea what’s going on inside. That’s right – instead of shifting the viewpoint from inside to outside like most (if not all) novels and movies about hostages, White did not write a single scene – not a single word – from the viewpoint of the hostage takers: readers, like the hostage negotiator; like the HRT; like Sam, Dee, and Poe; have no earthly idea what’s going on in there – or why it's happening. See what I mean about suspense?

As he has shown in past novels – both his standalones and the Gregory series – White is in his element when it comes to crafting his characters. It’s a treat to see behind Purdy’s cop mask, for instance. But White’s best chops are reserved for his new characters, Dee and Poe – with that relationship that’s a twenty-first century version of Burstyn and Alda in “Same Time Next Year.” Then there’s the local New Haven PD hostage negotiator, thrown into the shark tank on a world stage – she's one gutsy woman. Even minor characters are rock-solid.

Longtime White fans might be disappointed to find his usual protagonist, Boulder psychologist Alan Gregory, relegated to a small cameo role in the epilogue; though Gregory’s frequent running buddy Sam Purdy does get to strut his stuff. This isn’t the first time White’s left Gregory on the sidelines, however; he also played a minor character in 2005’s Kill Me; which, frankly, is the only other White offering to come close to The Siege for suspense. As far as this reader’s concerned, Stephen White doesn’t need to write any more Alan Gregory novels: more like The Siege will be just fine.

Stand Up For Yourself!

Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes - Chris Crutcher

There are few things on the face of the earth that are crueler than a teenager confronted by someone who is even the slightest bit "different." Saddled with a genetic code that left him on the husky side - heck, all the way on the other side of husky at F-A-T - it was inevitable that Eric Calhoune's life in Junior High and High School would be an endless string of wedgies, swirlies, and general mayhem at the hands of the "normal" guys in his class. Since misery loves company, "united we stand," and all that; it's no wonder that Eric eventually joined forces with the other misfit in his class, Sarah Byrnes. Sarah Byrnes - never just "Sarah" - didn't have bad genes, though, she had the kind of family on whom dysfunctional families look down their noses. At the age of three, her face had been severely burned and her father had categorically refused to allow any attempt to reconstruct her horribly scarred visage. Sarah "Burns," indeed.

All that was, however, before the high school swimming coach spotted Eric working out at the public pool. Long known as "Moby" (the great white whale) for both his size and his swimming ability, Eric reluctantly accepted her invitation to try out for the team. The daily three-hour workouts began to melt off excess poundage, and Eric found himself gorging like a bulimic prom queen in hopes of Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes. And when Sarah Byrnes found out what he was doing and why, she just whacked him upside the head and told him to cut it out and slim down. That's what friends do... That's also why after Sarah Byrnes stopped talking and got moved to the funny farm, Eric was the only kid from school to visit.

But Eric has plenty of other things on his plate besides visiting Sarah Byrnes: the swim team's prepping for state meets, the erstwhile fatty may actually finally have a girlfriend, and the fur is about to start flying at debates in his very special "Contemporary American Thought" class. This young man is in for a wild ride over the next few days; a wild ride that has "Chris Crutcher" written all over it.

Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes follows a pattern similar to that of other Crutcher books, books such as Running Loose. A teenaged boy finds his life changed by his interaction with a classic role model - an athletic coach - who also helps teach him some of life's most valuable lessons, even while a cadre of lemon-pussed adults tries to keep the young man "in his place." Crutcher's adolescent males seem to inhabit a world in which athletics and hard work are the crucibles in which "real men" are formed; a world in which there are two kinds of adults and the two camps seem to be pretty uneasy around each other.

From a literary standpoint, Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes isn't quite as well-written as Running Loose or Crutcher's autobiography, King of the Mild Frontier. The characters are just as rich and the lessons just as profound, but it just seems sometimes as if Crutcher is trying too hard to thumb his nose at his detractors. Unlike other Crutcher books I've read, this one seems just a little contrived - of course, he sets a pretty darned high bar. But his writing isn't why a certain group of people foam at the mouth whenever his name's mentioned...

What can one say about Chris Crutcher? As one of the most frequently-challenged authors of the past two decades, Crutcher continually stays centered on the radar screens of the bluenose set for his ever-frank approach to the lifestyle of teenaged males. He's not one to tiptoe around the subject of self-gratification (so near at hand... errr... dear to the heart of teenaged males); not one to soft-pedal the cloud of hormones that follows every teenaged boy like the cloud of dirt around Pigpen in "Charlie Brown." Worse, Crutcher is never shy about portraying a subset of adults as undeserving of the respect of youngsters - and worst of all, these inglorious adults seem to often occupy positions such as preacher, teacher, and principal. Small wonder that many would-be censors aren't too fond of him.

The distaste of challengers for Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes seems at times odd, since - just as Louie Banks in Running Loose - Eric Calhoune, hero of Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes, leads a pretty tame life. He doesn't have sex (at least not with anyone else). He doesn't drink, smoke, swear (much) or do drugs. Instead, he's a quiet, well-mannered young man who's hard-working, a good friend to Sarah Byrnes and Ellerby, and a loving son. What's not to like? Be that as it may, in truth Crutcher does at times seem to delight in poking the hornet's nest of censorship. In Staying Fat..., he touches on a broad array of topics from which some people would much rather shield their kids. The "Contemporary American Thought" class discussion of abortion is a case in point; but Crutcher's plot also brims with topics such as child abuse, suicide, hypocrisy, the existence of a God, and even adult sexuality. While on the surface the book is about self-realization - the dedication is to "All those who finally stand up for themselves" - Crutcher clearly intends to remind his audience that not every Evangelical Christian is a saint (Falwell, Hagedorn, Bakker...) and not every teacher has the best interests of his students in mind.

So why is Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes so often challenged? Darned if I can tell... OK, in truth it's pretty obvious: my guess (since I have a blood relative who is the kind of person who'd lobby to have this book banned) is that their objections include:

• a classroom dialogue on the topic of abortion - and not just a one-sided presentation, a dialogue
• an evangelical Christian who is a pure-D hypocrite
• a "mainstream" Christian minister who takes no guff from his evangelical brethren
• evil parents; parents who abandon children and/or physically and emotionally abuse them
• the occasional appearance of mild profanity
• a scattering of offhand (groan) references to masturbation
• an attempted suicide
• an adult who uses children as pawns
• a divorced mother who has boyfriends who... gasp! stay over!

In short, like my narrow-minded relative, the idea is to make certain that children are not exposed to other belief systems and other lifestyles. For that, bluenoses, I give you a big, fat raspberry: ppppppbbbbbbbbbbbttttttttttttt!

copyright © 2009-2017 scmrak

Finding God in Your Own Way: Bless Me Ultima

Bless Me, Ultima - Rudolfo Anaya

In the summer before he turned seven, there came many changes in the life of Antonio Márez; changes such as the first day of school, where he began to unlock the magic of letters and learn his first English. There was the return of his three older brothers, unharmed, from the war in Europe and Asia. But the greatest change of all was his parents' decision to welcome into their home the aging healer la Grande, or Ultima. This great curandera, midwife, and philosopher was famous both on the wilds of the eastern New Mexico llano, where Tony's father's people herded sheep and cattle, and in the rich bottomlands along the Pecos River where his mother's family tilled their fields and tended orchards. From the moment he first saw Ultima, Antonio realized that the two shared some special bond; that their fates were linked in a manner he could not describe.

For the Márez family, life was simple and yet complex: like some New World Romeo and Juliet, the marriage of Tony's parents joined rancher to farmer, with old enmity between the families still lying just beneath the surface. Forced by marriage to give up an almost nomadic existence on the llano, yet too proud to be a farmer, Tony's father instead worked for the state and drank to calm his genetic wanderlust. Meanwhile, his mother pined quietly for the rich soil of her family's valley and dreamed that her youngest son would someday be called to the priesthood. Still, theirs managed to be a happy family, and the next few years were happy days for Tony.

One day, Tony's uncle came to ask a favor of la Grande: another of Tony's uncles lay on his deathbed; the doctor could not help and the priest was of no help, either. Could the great curandera heal him; could she reverse the spell cast on him by an evil village woman? This was how Tony learned of Ultima's full power. There was another power in the young boy's life: the church of his mother, a devout Catholic. As First Communion approached and he completed his Catechism classes, Tony thought he could feel the majesty and glory of the Church - at clear odds with his friends from town, who teased Tony unmercifully about his faith, with that special cruelty of which only young children seem capable.

A child is a sort of psychic compass, pointing toward the greatest power in his vicinity, and Tony was no exception. He seemed to have no difficulty concocting a philosophy that integrated his mother's Catholicism, Ultima's shamanist spirituality, and even pantheic influences from his friend Cico with the tale of a godlike golden carp. Tony's faith in all three influences, however, would be tested early - and often - in his young life. Which of the three would provide the protection he most desired, protection against evil? Which, indeed...

Renowned Chicano author Rudolfo Anaya allows that his classic novel Bless Me, Ultima (also published in Spanish as Bendíceme, Ultima) is partially autobiographical in that it records parts of his childhood in the Santa Rosa area of eastern New Mexico. He's also been known to state that - although curanderas (traditional healers and herbalists) still plied their trade in his childhood, and in fact do so to this day - none like Ultima was part of his youth: instead, Ultima came to him in a dream as he began writing. If you ask me, that was one heckuva dream...

The life of a little boy in wartime New Mexico was wildly different from today: no internet or television, not even a radio; no soccer or Little League, no Cub Scouts or 4-H. Instead, Tony's days were filled by his chores around the house and his games with the boys from school. Anaya recounts that play as rough-and-tumble, filled to the brim by boasting and fighting, with curses hurled at one's playmates at the drop of a hat. Antonio's gang were all quite different from their younger friend, however, lacking both his faith and his desire to learn. They were more the type who would end up with DA haircuts and hot rods in high school, where Tony was obviously destined to become a man of learning - after all, Ultima said he would. Those of us who are interested in learning other languages (particularly the naughty words) will be pleased with Anaya's tale, which is chucky-jam full of both English and New Mexican Spanish maledictions (most of which I'd already learned from John Nichols in The Milagro Beanfield War).

The novel faithfully records a critical period in young Tony's life. It's a life filled by a loving family, friends of many stripes, and a strong vein of religion. Most of all, however, it's also a life guided by the mysterious Ultima, who many think a bruja or witch. As L. Frank Baum pointed out before Rudolfo Anaya was even born, however, there are not just wicked witches in this world: there are good witches as well.

Bless Me, Ultima is usually called a "coming-of-age" tale. In certain aspects, Tony's story is a typical coming-of-age tale; recording as it does the formative years of a young boy when he first leaves his mother's side for that great collection of stimuli called "school." Yet I personally consider "coming of age" a misnomer: instead, Anaya's novel is a coming-of-faith novel. In its three short years, little Tony weathered many crises of faith; witnessing death up close and personal, and observing the evils of the Church's deadliest sins, particularly wrath. At each of these critical moments, even as he took his First Communion, he felt a sort of emptiness in the religion that Europeans had forced upon his Native ancestors. Guided by Ultima's power, by her quiet competence and ancient calm, Tony was eventually able to reconcile his questioning with a different sort of spirituality, a spirituality that finds harmony with creation instead of attempts to control it.

An interesting and thought-provoking memoir, not to mention a novel that was crucial in helping elevate Latino literature in the eyes of the literary community.

Almost since the day it first hit store shelves in 1972, Anaya's novel has been challenged and banned in schools and communities nationwide. On the opposite end of the spectrum, it's also been chosen as a "community reads" book on several occasions (usually by liberal bastions such as Boulder, Colorado). Challenges generally cite the language (both English and Spanish) used by characters in the book, the presence of a brothel in Tony's little town (frequented by his brother Andrew), and the "glorification of witchcraft" - even before Harry Potter! It's a poorly-kept secret, though, that the main objection of most protestors to Bless Me, Ultima is that when Tony decides on a religious path top follow, Christianity loses out to a form of Native American animism - the detested "Earth Worship" they call "paganism" (see Gaia). Most practitioners of the type of Christianity that feels threatened by a spirituality embracing all of Earth as a blessed gift seem ignorant of the manner in which their own religion has appropriated pagan and animist symbology and celebrations into its theism, which is probably just as well: you wouldn't want their heads to explode (it would be messy).

Though a novel whose main character is a pre-teen boy, Bless Me, Ultima is far too mature for children of Tony's age. Even if you don't object to the frequent bilingual maledictions (one wonders if challengers are bamboozled by the lack of a glossary to define words like cabrón or jodido), the themes are clearly beyond the ken of preteens; even most early teens. I see no reason why a mature high-schooler (sadly, a vanishing breed) should not gain from the reading, however. If you're the type of person who believes that your child deserves a chance to think for him- or her-self, slip a copy into their stocking come Christmas - or Winter Solstice, if you prefer...

Death is a Three-Letter Word: N-A-M

Fallen Angels - Walter Dean Myers

For many men of my generation, the Baby Boomers, death might best be personified by three simple letters: N-A-M. Fought in a far-off land for reasons that were often unclear even to the combatants, the war in Vietnam still looms both as one of this country’s most humbling and its most divisive experiences. It seems capable of galvanizing the country’s most easily polarized even today, more than thirty-five years after the last jarhead scrambled into the last helicopter to lift from the grounds of the U. S. Embassy in Saigon. The war and the men and women who directed it, fought in it, and died in it have been memorialized in scores of motion pictures and thousands (if not tens of thousands) of books. One such volume, directed toward a young adult audience, is Walter Dean Myers’ Fallen Angels. Myers’ book has garnered its share of awards: it’s received a Coretta Scott King Award; and was cited in the American Library Association’s (ALA) Margaret A. Edwards Award presented to Myers for his lifetime contribution to young adult literature. It’s also generated its share of controversy: Fallen Angels stands at number twenty-four on the ALA list of 100 most frequently challenged and banned books (1990-2000) and number six in the ALA’s list of most frequently challenged books of the twenty-first century. But why? To understand, perhaps you must understand the story…

Fallen Angels is not a deep philosophical discussion of the war in Vietnam; it’s a single soldier’s diary of his one and only tour of duty in-country. As seen through the eyes of seventeen-year-old Richie Perry, Vietnam is an alien land; dark and steamy and full of danger the youngster from Harlem has never sensed before. He misses his mother, his brother, shooting hoops with his friends. The other “men” – men by virtue of being a soldier in the midst of a war zone, not for their age – of Charlie Company become more than bunkmates: white, brown, or black they become brothers for having shared hell on earth. Though out in “The World” back in 1967 racial tension is shaking the cities; in Chu Lai and Tam Ky, everyone bleeds the same bright red blood no matter what the color of his skin. It’s a lesson Richie has learned quickly…

Through vivid descriptions of the few months of his tour, Richie Perry bears witness to the insanity inherent in war; to the moral ambiguity that so characterizes the war in Vietnam even to this day. His descriptions of battle action are raw; his record of a boy-soldier’s emotions powerful and lucid. It’s an account that is almost hackneyed for the appearance of all the standard highlights of a war narrative: the sudden death of the guy standing next to you; the slow and agonizing death of a man-child; the battle-hardened veteran NCO dismissive of his charges; the officer exposing troops to additional danger as he’s bucking for a promotion. Since the war is Vietnam, we know to expect racial hatred of anyone small and Asian; watch for the round-eyes’ frustration at their inability to distinguish between friend and foe; await the overreaction of the American soldiers to one too many deaths.

In the crucible of war, Richie Perry becomes something more than he was when he arrived. And yet he returns to his home diminished…

Walter Dean Myers penned Fallen Angels in 1988, fifteen years after the fall of Saigon and twenty years after the events chronicled in his book. He takes his title from the prayer uttered by a young lieutenant upon the death of a soldier under his command:

“Lord, let us feel pity for Private Jenkins, and sorrow for ourselves, and all the angel warriors that fall. Let us fear death, but let it not live within us. Protect us, O Lord, and be merciful unto us. Amen.”

Based in part on his own experiences as a soldier in the early 1960s, Myers’ depiction of life on the battlefields of Vietnam had little different to say when it was published in 1988; long after movies like “Coming Home” and “Apocalypse Now” had inserted catchphrases like “Charlie don’t surf” or “I love the smell of napalm in the morning” into the American consciousness. Richie Perry’s story is, however, even more powerful because he becomes everyman by simply surviving from day to day. His is a story told in a stark, linear narrative; unvarnished by flowery language and maudlin sentiments – the words of a simple young man who has to conserve all his strength for the business of surviving. It is this straightforward simplicity that imbues Fallen Angels with such power – and has made it a classic in the genre of soldier’s diaries, just as “Vietnam” made death a three-letter word.

When people challenge books in schools and libraries, they are usually required to state the rationale for their objection. Fallen Angels has been challenged often in the past twenty years, ostensibly on the basis of raw language and – oddly enough, for a book written by a Black man about a Black soldier – for racism. Indeed, words beginning with S, H, D, and F do occur in its pages, albeit somewhat less often than one might expect of a war story. The so-called N word also makes an appearance or two, much in the same context as in gangsta rap (which, frankly, doesn’t say much in its favor).

Fallen Angels has also been challenged for “promoting homosexuality”: one character might be homosexual, while another says he doesn’t much care as long as the guy can fight. Yup, that’s “promotion” all right… It’s likewise been challenged in some venues as “pornographic” (I kid you not) and a “sex manual” (an odd description, given that the protagonist is still a virgin at the end of the book). Perhaps the only true grounds for objection might be for its violent nature; but if war isn’t violent, then what is? Besides, few challengers (if any) complain of the book's violence.

It’s curious that protests against Fallen Angels increased in the first few years of the twenty-first century, at precisely the same time that the country ramped up for, entered, and prosecuted a “good” war in the Middle East; one more “recovery” from the bad taste the war in Vietnam a generation ago left in the nation’s collective mouth. Perhaps the book’s open discussion of atrocities committed during that earlier war threatened some of the more PATRIOTic Americans, who felt that leaving it on library shelves might give young men and women pause when considering entering the armed forces. Indeed, Myers candidly discusses mutiny, “fragging” a superior officer, mutilation of corpses, a friendly fire incident, “collateral damage” involving the population of an entire village, bogus body counts, and a host of other shameful acts exposed by the memoirs of Vietnam veterans (although nothing about the humiliation and torture of prisoners of war). One can only hope that the forces of “right” are not so cynical as to attempt to put a positive spin on the Vietnam era by silencing critical viewpoints. One can only hope…