Smoke on the Water
In 1971, the war in Vietnam still rages. Jason Conley, a recent college graduate, finds himself paying the price for the “free” university education a NROTC scholarship provided and now owes the Navy four years of service. Not wanting to go to war, he devises a scheme to serve on an oceanographic research support vessel in Hawaii, thousands of miles from the battle zone. A brilliant plan, if it works. And it does-at first.
Through a series of events and miscues, some of his own making, Jason is transferred to a new command, a destroyer escort that deploys on a WestPac tour to Vietnam the very day he sets foot aboard. How will he reconcile his feelings about the Vietnam War while at the same time directing a destroyer escort on the gunline supporting US and South Vietnamese troops? How will his personal life be affected by the dictates of the Navy? And more importantly, how does he come out of this alive?
“Smoke on the Water” is based on real life events. It is a coming-of-age tale that occurs in less than four years’ time, spanning events from the East Coast to Hawaii to Southeast Asia. It encompasses journeys and adventures in foreign lands, loves found and lost, humorous situations, and a maturation process within one man compressed in the pressure cooker of an unpopular war.
If you liked M*A*S*H you’ll love this book.
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Jack Bartley lived on Oahu for almost five years while serving as an officer in the US Navy in the 1970s, completing a WestPac/Vietnam tour on a Knox-class destroyer escort during that time. He returned to the East Coast to earn his PhD in ecology and was an associate professor at the University of Delaware. He is now retired and devotes his time to writing and music. Jack is a docent at the James Farm Ecological Preserve near his home in Ocean View, Delaware, where he lives with his wife, Susan, Jesse the Dog, and Clementine the Cat.
