[.ca] Vietnam, Now: A Reporter Returns (ISBN 1586481835)

From Amazon.com:
For most Americans, writes veteran correspondent David Lamb, "Vietnam was a war, not a country"--even worse, it was sometimes merely "an adjective, usually with a negative connotation." The author was practically a cub reporter when he covered the war a generation ago; in Vietnam, Now, he returns to it, bringing with him a sharp analytic eye developed over the ensuing years. His key observations include the unexpected fact that "the Vietnamese liked Americans.... They had put the war behind them in a way that many Americans hadn't." This is not to say that things have gone swimmingly for the Vietnamese, especially in an economic sense: "Vietnam was like a racehorse whose jockey kept yanking on the reins rather than giving the animal its head to find full stride." And lingering still is the divide between North and South: "The officially articulated policy was always that all Vietnamese were equal; it's just that it didn't turn out that way. Ironically, the communist leadership \oin Hanoi\c found it easier to reach out to its former enemy in Washington than to its own brethren in the South." Vietnam, Now is an ideal book for anybody interested in Southeast Asia, perhaps especially veterans who wonder whatever happened to that place where they fought so hard for so long. --John Miller

Vietnam Now - Wow!:
In this book, David Lamb returns to Vietnam thirty years after covering the war as a journalist. He spent four years living in Hanoi and during this time he explores Vietnam and interviews many people including well-known figures of the war such as the Vietnamese Radio Personality Hanoi Hannah and General Vo Nguyen Gap. Lamb also interviews numerous Vietnamese citizens and also tags along with a group of former American and Viet Cong soldiers who are searching for reconciliation. In Vietnam, Now, Mr. Lamb draws comparisons and contrasts and in doing so paints a vivid picture of what Vietnam of the 1960's versus what Vietnam now is like. As he states in the introduction to his book: "The Vietnam I experienced was really two different countries, and neither had much to do with the other. The first was the Vietnam of the American War, as the Vietnamese call it... It was the Vietnam of body counts and illusionary lights at the end of the tunnel. It was a Vietnam that, I now realize, I understood shamefully little about, being largely ignorant of the country's history, culture, and people..." "The other Vietnam is the one that wove the spell and teased me of the ghosts of a bygone Indochina... This is the postwar Vietnam, where for the first time in more than 100 years a generation has grown into adulthood not knowing foreign domination of the sound of battle... I stayed four years, far longer than I had intended, and during that time I found that nothing was quite as I had expected it to be." It is the country, the people, and the history, that David Lamb discovers during his four year return to Vietnam, and it is the stories of this country, its people, and its history that Mr. Lamb weaves into all 270 pages of Vietnam, Now. Even though I hadn't been born yet, the writing and description in this book transported me back to the era of war and fighting now known as the Vietnam War Era. This book also did a magnificent job of placing me in Mr. Lamb's shoes during peacetime in Vietnam. I recommend this book to anyone looking to gain knowledge about the country and people and history of Vietnam as a whole, not just as a war seen through American history books. Pick up a copy of Vietnam, Now. After reading this book you will be left with one adjective to describe it - "Wow."

Moving, informative, and timely:
The author spent four years, 1996 to 2000, in Vietnam and his book is filled with information and is not fiction like Nelson deMille's Up Country, which is also an account of present-day Vietnam. I think the points that Lamb makes about the men who fought in Vietnam are informative and little known--drug use in Vietnam was about the same as in the U.S at the time, the suicide rate was similar, the honorable discharge rate the same as before the war, etc. The account of men who returned to Vietnam to visit is full of poignancy. I thought this was a moving and thoughtful and poignant book, and much more attention-holding than I expected. No bibliography, though.

It's a country, not a war...:
Vietnam is a country of 78 million living in an area a bit larger than the size of Italy. The people and the landscapes of this nation are both extremely diverse. But to many, Vietnam is simply a war, a chapter of history, a place of terrible memories. Lamb does an excellent job of showing, through his words, Vietnam's beauty and diversity. During his travels from Hanoi to Saigon (HCMC), he interviews Vietnamese people from all walks of life. Some remember the war vividly, some were not born yet, some could care less. For most Vietnamese, the American War is something that has long passed. Lamb illustrates what Vietnam really is, an amazing country with some of the FRIENDLIEST people on Earth. If you can not go to Vietnam (but by all means, GO! I just returned and I found it to be most amazing!), please read this book. I think you will quickly learn that there is a LOT more to Vietnam than the American War.

Eye-opener:
Vietnam, Now, by David Lamb, is truly an eye-opener. This novels consists of David Lamb's accounts of visiting Vietnam both when he was a soldier during the Vietnam war, and later again about 30 years post- war. He compares and contrasts the two different time periods when he visited, with much detail, using unique writing techniques that transport the reader into Lamb's shoes. Vietnam, Now eliminates many misconceived notions of Vietnam held by many Americans today. Overall, this is a well written book and an excellent read for anyone.

A tad more "Then" than "Now":
For anyone trying to ford the quagmire of myth and fact that surrounds the Vietnam conflict, this book is a necessary buoy. Mr. Lamb-whose current coverage of Vietnam for the Los Angeles Times is superb, though it is often soft-gives a voice and character to post-1975 Vietnam that has been significantly lacking in American literature. He discusses the war, Vietnam-American politics and the ruling Communist party with Vietnamese veterans and the younger generation as well. These conversations reveal a view of the war that contrasts entirely with the American view; as Mr. Lamb writes, the Vietnamese do not mourn the war as Americans do. Instead, they see it as proof of their national pride and perseverance. Nevertheless, Mr. Lamb provides disturbing detail of how the war tore apart the physical and social fabric of Vietnam, and how politics and old weapons still wreak their havoc today. Though brilliant, this book deals a lot with the war, both as a history of past days and the lingering effects. Mr. Lamb does go into detail about Vietnam's growing presence on the world market, burgening political reform and the somewhat restless and idealistic views of the country's youth. Yet, these themes, much like the whole of Mr. Lamb's book, always revert back to the war, as it was then and is today, so that nary a chapter is free from its mention. Thus, Mr. Lamb shows that even Americans who try to get over that bloody period can't.