Tom O' Vietnam

Fiction. Baron Wormser has done something important with TOM O' VIETNAM in the way that he has identified and precisely embraced a stunningly particular historical moment we casually refer to as 'Viet Nam, ' as if the name was not a country but a dark shroud of moral collapse that hangs over us still. More remarkably, he has constructed this narrative from the point of view of a combat soldier, fighting in the American War in Viet Nam. Somehow there is a deep legitimacy to this soldier's story because Wormser has been excruciatingly precise in his consideration and use of details--what Hemingway called 'getting the words right.' Built into TOM O' VIETNAM's narrative is a clever, bright and engaging analysis of King Lear that parallels the primary narrative in richly imaginative ways. Inventive, immodestly challenging more than a few literary fictive conventions, and sometimes even beautifully written, TOM O 'VIETNAM is, at the same time, in a class by itself and resonant of great works about Viet Nam that have come before.--Bruce Weigl