Soldier in Paradise

John Mort's compelling first novel embodies both the Vietnam combat experience and the sad aftermath for those who underwent it. Alternating between “stateside” chapters after the war and the Vietnam chapters dramatizing it, the novel creates a tension back and forth in time as well as geography. We participate in the trauma of combat in crisp and authentic detail, and we witness the effect of that experience on “Irish” Donnelly, a bookish, reluctant soldier, and his fellow infantrymen in t...