The Aardvark Is Ready for War: A Novel [Hardcover]

James W. Blinn (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1997

A debut novel weaves a compelling, ironic tale about the experiences of an Anti-Submarine Warfare Specialist Second Class who calls himself Aardvark, on his way via aircraft carrier to the Persian Gulf War. 25,000 first printing. Tour.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Aardvark is an antisubmarine warfare specialist aboard an aircraft carrier during the Persian Gulf War who earned his nickname because he always wears his gas mask. Though he lives for war games and simulations, Aardvark can only deal with war first-hand through his mask. On his last shore leave before his ship sails for the Persian Gulf, Aardvark comes face to face with murder. Suddenly, the war is all too close, and Aardvark goes on sick call to avoid flight time, certain he won't survive combat. He manages to make his "illness" last until the last day of the war, when his plane loses an engine and crash-lands on the carrier. Blinn's first novel is populated with all kinds of characters and situations both wacky and weird. To illustrate Aardvark's confusion, he often goes off on wild tangents, losing the reader in irrelevant description and hyperbole, making for an uneven story. This is war from a slightly skewed angle, the Catch-22 of the Persian Gulf War without the wit. Not an essential purchase.?Grant A. Fredericksen, Illinois Prairie Dist. P.L., Metamora
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews

An antic, abrasively obscene, and extremely noisy first novel that attempts to do for the Persian Gulf War what M.A.S.H. and Catch-22 did for (or, if you will, to) the Korean War and WW II. The narrator, identified only as ``Greg,'' is a Navy airman specializing in tracking submarines who adopts the code name Aardvark. His real interests lie in capturing the screwy vicissitudes of everyday military life with his ``camcorder,'' and saturating himself in the intricate technological shoptalk of a war whose reality seems contained in TV images. Blinn recounts his likable nonhero's picaresque adventures (mixing it up stateside with a married buddy, hunkering down in Hawaii with a female literature major who despises Dead White Males) with a rough, slangy vigor that's great fun whenever his paragraphs aren't clogged with wearying technical detail. The disparity between Aardvark's flip intimacy with the carnage he monitors (while aboard an aircraft carrier heading toward the Mideast) and the very real terror that overtakes him when he's about to be thrust headlong into military action, isn't especially original, except for his wired, frantic, funny voice. The best things here are the impudent mockery of military logic (``Why practice anti-submarine warfare when the bad guys don't have subs?'') and the fresh comic invention (a pair of old ladies overheard discussing their favorite serial killers; an imitation-American fast food joint that advertises ``Dessert Storm Combos--Patriot burgers and Smart Bomb fries''). The novel's worst features--which, unfortunately, predominate--are its numerous echoes of Catch-22, which include its protagonist's flustered efforts to avoid combat, a comrade's surprising descent into murder and madness, a ship's doctor who calls himself ``Daneeka,'' and a bloody, surreal climax. Joseph Heller may not want to sue, but he won't want to finish the book either. Though this debut has both style and energy, it lacks the savage originality of the predecessors Blinn so clearly admires. (Author tour) -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 279 pages
• Publisher: Little Brown & Co (T); 1st edition (May 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0316099872
• ISBN-13: 978-0316099875
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.5 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,856,661 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars entertaining and original, March 11, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Aardvark Is Ready for War: A Novel (Hardcover)

Linn has read a bit too much Jean Baudrillard (who he quotes up front) but that's okay, this book is ambitious as hell. At a time when most writers are retreating to small town fables or "historical" fiction, Linn wrestles with late 20th century weirdness and succeeds with a highly entertaining and original book. Don't pray for the movie--this book is way too internal to make it to the screen. It's too bad that Little and Brown didn't put a bit more marketing muscle behind this book. Maybe someone will get smart and put it out in paperback, but I'd act now and get yourself a nice, new first edition before they all run out.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A latter-day "Catch-22", May 13, 2001

By 

TheIrrationalMan - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Aardvark Is Ready for War: A Novel (Hardcover)

Though it is not as good as "Catch-22", this novel sparkles with sassy dialogue, military argot and flashy gadgets, becoming, in the process, an authentic account of the technologised conflict which was the Gulf War. It implies how, in the light of how life today is dominated by digital satellite technology, camcorders and computers, everyone has assumed the role of voyeur. The anonymous narrator is a recruit enlisted to fight in the "hyperral" Gulf War crisis, in which, by virtue of the hi-tech surveillance equipment employed, the perception of a thing becomes a way of "manipulating" it. The book is stuffed with borrowings from such postmodern epigones as Baudrillard, and is far more philosophically complex than one might expect, though redeemed also by its irreverent humour.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars It's Not about war, it's about Amerika. . . ., January 3, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Aardvark Is Ready for War: A Novel (Hardcover)

If you want a war book read Tom Clancy. This book is about everything crackpot Amerikan as difracted through the prism of the Gulf War. The publisher compares it to Joseph heller but really it's more Don Delillo meets Kurt Vonnegut through a wormhole on the backside of the looking glass. Toss in some Celine and the bastard son of William Burroughs and Jean Baudrillard. Stir well and take in one gulp. The funniest, most sarcastic parody I've read since 'Infinite Jest'. The first fun ontological novel. Must be read to be believed. AND, {added benefit) reading it will make you smarter. Pray for a movie. That's all I say, just pray for a movie.