Download Lonely Girls With Burning Eyes: A Wife Recalls Her Husband's Journey Home from Vietnam djvu

This is a Vietnam memoir like no other. Novak provides an honest, well-crafted account of how a young married couple and their married friends addressed the challenges of that era. Young Marine Corps officers and their wives come alive on the pages of this book. Although I had a student deferment throughout that period and did not serve, I began volunteering at the Vietnam Memorial Wall in Washington after my retirement from the Department of Justice. Since that time, I have devoured a fair number of Vietnam memoirs. Visitors to the Wall want to know more about that war and often discuss with me what they should read. I mention two or three memoirs, then tell them to "Google" Marian Novak and order her book to get an invaluable perspective that is lacking in all the others. Steve Learned

While this book is about a select group of people, primarily the wives of student officer lieutenants from Quantico, training for the Viet Nam war, it is really about any of those left behind, wives, families and friends. In that era, our country confused the warriors with the unpopular war and that added to the stress on wives and families.

While the mood of the country is now different about our servicemen and women, the impact of war on young lives remains the same, particularly on young couples who are just starting married life, must live with the threat of death facing them. A sequence in which the author rejoices because her husband was "only wounded," is particularly poignant. Getting to know each other as husband and wife while recognizing that the arduous training is for a deadly purpose adds strain to young marriages.

And, for what is now common knowledge, the war does not end when the young husbands come home. They and their wives must confront the demons that combat brings. A difficult, but very moving and well written book.

This book was in great condition for a used book. Since the book has been out of print for many years, I thought this would be the only way to find a copy. The story is of a young girl, who's new husband goes to Vietnam for a 1 year tour of duty. Her own family, which has never had anyone in the military, offers no support. Her mother-in-law is someone she barely knows, but shares her worry and concern for the man they both love. Upon his return, Ms Novak details how her husband had been changed by the war and the many years it took for him to truly "return" to her.

The corrolation between the Vietnam war veterans and today's veterans who have served in Iraq and Afganistan may be striking for many military spouses, and other family members.

Great book from a wife's perspective

In 1989, I took a writing workshop at Simmons College in Boston, mostly because Robert Cormier, a great writer, was speaking. I wound up in a class taught by C. Michael Curtis, the fiction editor of The Atlantic(!). Every morning he'd read aloud one of our stories anonymously and we'd comment, analyze, and give our feedback, which was often very emotional and passionate. But the class was always civilized, even when the critique was not very positive. Some of the writers had been published in some good journals, unlike me. I couldn't be objective and didn't know whether I was incredibly out of my league or would be benignly considered a neophyte with some potential.

During the class I'd become friendly with a student named Marian. She was about 15 or 20 years older than me (26) yet despite apparent differences we got along well. She was emotionally honest, smart, and we had fun talking about and trying to figure out our fellow students: the Hollywood guy who had been to a million workshops and had sold a story on it's 54th submission, the literate 70ish guy who had only been writing for a few years, etc. She talked warmly about her husband. I believe they both taught at Simmons. I didn't connect as well with anybody else and like what happens during a lot of these kind of short, intense experiences away -- vacations, week-long conferences, temp jobs -- we made a pretty solid bond.

Near the end of the workshop, Mike Curtis read a harrowing story about a group of Marines, all Vietnam vets, who get together for a reunion at a hotel on the Charles River in Boston. They all fought together (if memory serves) and tell stories about the people they knew and experiences they had. But the conversation doesn't really get going until one of them says something like, "What scared you the most over there?" I wish I could tell you some specifics about those tales now but all I can say is that they were full of terror, strangeness, anguish, intense love, loyalty, and dread.

The class was pretty quiet after Mike finished. Finally we started speaking and the general consensus was that this was one of the best stories heard all week. We speculated about who wrote it. The Hollywood guy's story had been heard, the old guy was too old for Vietnam, I was too young, and the one guy left didn't seem the type.

As we went to a little lunch the college had prepared for us I told Marian all these thoughts and my confusion over not being able to figure which guy wrote the story. I was frustrated -- I'm pretty good at sizing people up, listening, and reading things that are under the surface (I became a social services family counselor right after this).

I looked at her and her face was red and her mouth was taught. "I wrote that," she said. I think now that she wasn't red from embarrassment but from something like pain, conviction, and pride. "My husband was in Vietnam when we were first married. I know all those guys or guys like them. I've heard them tell their stories." There was a tense second as I looked at her in shock and I guess she waited to see what the hell I was going to say. I laughed a little and said, after saying "Wow," a bunch of times, "You sure as hell do." She was one great writer.

Marian, if you ever read this, I hope I didn't get any of the big details wrong. Some of the quotes are correct and some are paraphrased but, I think, pretty accurate. To everyone else, at the very least, remember the last line above.

I read this book many years ago but I still recall some of the writing and how powerful and moving it was. This is a book for anyone, whether you have family in the military or not. Those who do will get even more from it.

I've been a military spouse for 16 years now and a lot of the experiences that Marian Novak writes about, though way before my time, still ring true to this day. I found the book years ago at a local library and liked it so much that I went out and bought it. I've read the book several times since, sometimes just to remind me that there have been and are women out there in the same situation, with the same fears as me. A very informative, meaningful book for any spouse in the military but especially for those whose better half had to endure service in a war.

Marian Novak's story of a wartime bride needed to be told and she is the perfect writer to tell it. Anyone would benefit to hear her story--if you have lived it or not. Those who have been married to a soldier--or had any loved one at war--will feel a bond and comradeship. Anyone who has not had this experience should read this--there is so much we do not know. I am in awe at her ability to share it.

I will be a USMC wife on July 4th, 1999 and so much of what Mrs. Novak writes about is so similar to my own encounters with the USMC. Anyone who has a loved one in the military should read this book. It's time our story was told.