Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
What was it like in Vietnam--How in the hell do you describe it?, 6 Nov 2008
This is clearly a question about which the author of The Second Tour, Terry P. Rizzuti, has thought long and hard. The results of his deliberation are found within the pages of his stunning debut novel, a work in which readers discover an intriguing and compellingly fresh answer.
The Second Tour tells the story of Vietnam in fragmented, non-sequential visions from the perspective of Rootie, a low-level marine. He describes how he and his friends survived, how they lived, and how they died--although not necessarily in that order. By also giving readers brief glimpses of his life after Vietnam, he allows them to see the tremendous impact that serving in Vietnam for just thirteen months has had on his life.
Despite his descriptions of the hardships of war, Rizzuti does not make any moral judgements about the men who fought in Vietnam. Rizzuti tells his story in a frank and subtle manner that prevents him from using the clichés to which so many authors of his genre resort. His matter-of-fact, conversational style often makes readers feel as if they have wandered into a bar where a Vietnam veteran is telling his story by recalling bits and pieces of what he remembers--maybe showing them the odd letter that he wrote home while Bob Dylan songs play on the jukebox.
Rizzuti's style of writing completely captivates and intrigues his audience. As his story jumps decades, often within the span of several paragraphs, readers are frequently uncertain from which location or year the narrator is speaking as they read the initial line of any section. Although this may sound confusing or complicated to some potential readers, at no time do readers become overwhelmed, or does the novel become overly convoluted. Because Rootie's flawlessly flowing narrative links all the events together, it is of no consequence that the events are narrated out of sequence; in fact, such a style of narration only adds to the enjoyment of this refreshing take on a subject that has been often explored.
In short, The Second Tour's honesty, sincerity, and authenticity makes it clear from the beginning that this novel could only have been written by someone who was actually in Vietnam. Although a work of fiction, The Second Tour is based on events few have experienced, providing a fascinating insight into war and the boys who eventually become men when they are sent to fight it.
The Second Tour is not only an electrifying read for fans of the genre, but also a fitting epitaph for those who lost their lives far away from home.
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4.0 out of 5 stars
Highly recommended by J. Helman, Allbooks Review, 13 Nov 2008
As we remember the history of our lives there is a tendency to forget the individual as we consider the scope of the events, even those through which we have lived. The fictionalized story of Terry Rizzuti's service in Vietnam vividly brings to mind the idea that history is written and perceptions of it shaped by the observers of history rather than the participants. March along with Terry Rizzuti as he and his brethren in arms go through and experiences the horrors of war as only the foot soldier can. It is he who truly knows war.
The episodes described in this book are honest and told with little judgment. The reader can feel the heat of the jungle and the dread of encountering a foe that is greatly unlike the enemy faced by the fathers of the men who fought in Vietnam. Only by reading this book can a person hope to share in the experiences of a Marine Rifleman and those who fought with him through patrols, booby traps, conflicts with superiors, and the loves and hates of men who are thrown together from all parts of the country and expected to accomplish a given mission.
This book is written in a style that some might find to be disconcerting. This should not discourage a reader. This is one of those rare books that only by completing it and contemplating it can the reader internalize it and make it one's own. If someone lived in or grew up through these turbulent times then the style might be strikingly reminiscent of Procul Harum's undeclared anthem of the 60's, `A whiter shade of Pale.' The parts of this story which encompass a year in the war and hints of the struggles to `fit in' after the return home bombard the reader with fragments of a quilt. And as a person minutely examines a quilt, then backs up and looks at the whole, the feel and aim of this book can only be appreciated with the perspective of reflection after closing the back cover after reading the words of that most American of all bugle calls, `Taps' which is which is the reassuring lullaby that means a soldier is at peace.
This book comes highly recommended from an author who has a degree in English Literature and has won several awards for writing and analysis of literature. It is well worth the time to read and savor and remember.
Reviewer: John Helman, Allbooks Reviews.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
The Psychological Wounds and Spiritual Scars of War., 11 Nov 2008
All war is brutal. Yet one of the worst conflicts of them all is too often overshadowed by our nostalgia for the peace and love ethos of the late 1960's. Vietnam, especially for non-Americans, was no more than a fuzzy image on a black and white TV set. But this war saw the barbarism and amorality typically associated with the wars of antiquity, yet took place little more than a generation ago.
The raw savagery that occurred in Vietnam is acutely brought into focus in Terry P. Rizzuti's first novel, The Second Tour. Based on his own experiences as a Marine, the novel describes the suffering, fear and loss of American soldiers during the conflict. But it equally shows the sadistic violence that these same soldiers exerted on others, both on the enemy and sometimes on their own side.
Described in short vignettes, these scenes of violence are told without judgement. There is no morality in Vietnam because no sanction against wrongdoing could be worse than being in Vietnam itself. Instead, these young soldiers become young Nietzschean Ubermensch, creating their own belief systems within a nihilistic vacuum. As Rootie (the narrator) repeats in the book: "God is boys." It is not surprising, then, that Rootie struggles with the God of his Italian-American Catholic upbringing. Indeed, some of the single-paragraph chapters assume a psalm-like quality, as though Rootie is composing his own articles of faith.
While the comfort of home remains the "real" world, the hot and humid hills and jungle of Vietnam provide an environment without any apparent logic. This is presented in the novel by utilizing a modernist style that forgoes a chronological narrative in favour of a structure that skips between time and place, as the narrator's memories demand.
Rootie (and perhaps Rizzuti himself), 27 years after his tour, like many of his comrades, never really manages to overcome the events he lived and witnessed in Vietnam. Thus, two narratives intertwine: one, the first tour as Rootie experiences fighting in Vietnam; and the second tour, the one back home, as Rizzuti exorcises this experience in a shocking but moving way.
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