SELECTED BY MILITARY TIMES AS A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR * SELECTED BY
THE SOCIETY OF MIDLAND AUTHORS' AS THE BEST NONFICTION BOOK OF THE
YEAR
The New York Times bestselling author of In Harm's Way and Horse
Soldiers shares the powerful account of an American army platoon
fighting for survival during the Vietnam War in "an important
book....not just a battle story--it's also about the home front" (The
Today show).
On January 31, 1968, as many as 100,000 guerilla fighters and soldiers
in the North Vietnamese Army attacked thirty-six cities throughout South
Vietnam, hoping to dislodge American forces during one of the vital
turning points of the Vietnam War. Alongside other young American
soldiers in an Army reconnaissance platoon (Echo Company, 1/501) of the
101st Airborne Division, Stanley Parker, the nineteen-year-old son of a
Texan ironworker, was suddenly thrust into savage combat, having been
in-country only a few weeks. As Stan and his platoon-mates, many of whom
had enlisted in the Army, eager to become paratroopers, moved from hot
zone to hot zone, the extreme physical and mental stresses of Echo
Company's day-to-day existence, involving ambushes and attacks, grueling
machine-gun battles, and impossibly dangerous rescues of wounded
comrades, pushed them all to their limits and forged them into a
lifelong brotherhood. The war became their fight for survival.
When they came home, some encountered a bitterly divided country that
didn't understand what they had survived. Returning to the small farms,
beach towns, and big cities where they grew up, many of the men in the
platoon fell silent, knowing that few of their countrymen wanted to hear
the stories they lived to tell--until now. Based on interviews, personal
letters, and Army after-action reports, The Odyssey of Echo Company
recounts the searing tale of wartime service and homecoming of ordinary
young American men in an extraordinary time and confirms Doug Stanton's
prominence as an unparalleled storyteller of our age.
