My Detachment

Kidder, a young ROTC intelligence officer, expects to serve Stateside when orders come for Vietnam. Responsible for an army unit of eight men reporting enemy radio positions, he finds himself far removed from the mortal danger of battle, hunting a shadowy enemy, tracking radio transmissions and passing on intelligence collected by others. Kidder soon realizes with relief and ambivalence that he will get no closer to the war than the radio. The "detachment" of the title seems to refer to a distance from the experience that his narration makes clear. His delivery is unemotional; he is more narrator than main character, making the story an examination of the nation's detachment from this chapter of our history. N.E.M. (c) AudioFile 2006, Portland, Maine