Smoke on the Water

<p><strong style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1); background-color: rgba(255 255 255 1)>Winner of the Military Writers Society of America Silver Medal for 2025</strong></p><p></p><p><strong>. . . will keep you wanting to turn the next page. -Richard Hess US Air Force officer (Ret.) and coauthor of <em>Night of the Bear</em></strong></p><p>In 1971 the war in Vietnam still rages. Jason Conley a recent college graduate finds himself paying the price for the free university education a NROTC scholarship provided and now owes the Navy four years of service. Not wanting to go to war he devises a scheme to serve on an oceanographic research support vessel in Hawaii thousands of miles from the battle zone. A brilliant plan if it works. And it does-at first.</p><p>Through a series of events and miscues some of his own making Jason is transferred to a new command a destroyer escort that deploys on a WestPac tour to Vietnam the very day he sets foot aboard. How will he reconcile his feelings about the Vietnam War while at the same time directing a destroyer escort on the gunline supporting US and South Vietnamese troops? How will his personal life be affected by the dictates of the Navy? And more importantly how does he come out of this alive?</p><p><em>Smoke on the Water </em>is based on real life events. It is a coming-of-age tale that occurs in less than four years' time spanning events from the East Coast to Hawaii to Southeast Asia. It encompasses journeys and adventures in foreign lands loves found and lost humorous situations and a maturation process within one man compressed in the pressure cooker of an unpopular war.</p><p>If you liked M*A*S*H you'll love this book.</p>