J. Michael Orange

Fire in the Hole: a Mortarman in Vietnam J. Michael Orange

How does a young man coming of age in the 1960s go from seminarian to soldier? What can scare an average kid from Cleveland into killing for his country? The answer: Vietnamthat soul-sucking war that still invades dreams. After surviving a year of combat and the loss of fellow Marines, Orange came home in 1970 to another battlefieldKent State University, where the Ohio National Guard gunned down his classmates. Reeling and confused, he went from soldier to seaman on a Great Lakes ore carrier. Then he became a hippie who fought against the same war he once supported, the same war that stole his youth and innocence. Orange reflects on his journey of tumult and tears from a vantage point of age and wisdom. This is a survivors tale, told with honesty and compassion for those who fought on both sides of a conflict that sliced through the lives of so many.