Men In Green Faces [Mass Market Paperback]

Gene Wentz (Author), B. Abell Jurus (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 15, 1993

They go out into the jungle as a team, inserted by Swift Boat or Huey for maximum impact. And when they killings tops, the enemy only knows one thing: they were hit by the Men in Green Faces.

At base camp they wash off the paint, the blood and the mud, talk about home, and keep their weapons clean. But one of them is slipping into his own private war. His squad think Gene is their good luck charm. Gene thinks God is keeping him alive for one reason only: to find and kill a rogue NVA colonel--and everyone around him.

This classic novel of Vietnam, written by former SEAL Gene Wentz and B. Abell Jurus, remains the most powerful and starkly realistic vision of Seal action ever captured in writing. here is the story of a good soldier trained to be part of an elite team of warriors--and of the killing grounds where he was forever changed.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

With just weeks remaining in his 180-day tour of Vietnam, Navy SEAL Gene Michaels hopes he will live to see his pregnant wife again, but he thrives on his dangerous missions. In fact, he feels his service will be incomplete if he does not eliminate a North Vietnamese Army "enforcer," one Col. Nguyen, who has brought terror to South Vietnamese villages. His determination redoubles after his best friend dies in a Nguyen-led ambush. Intensifying Michaels's despair is the likelihood that the team was sold out by a Vietnamese interrogator whom he had offended. But finding Nguyen, while a high priority for the U.S. war effort, does not postpone any other missions. Michaels and his team are "inserted and extracted" literally every day, entering impenetrable jungles and engaging numerically superior forces. In what is to be their final mission, for example, Michaels leads his team of seven against Nguyen and a division of 5000 North Vietnamese regulars. But even this explosive "op" does not prove as deadly as the mission Michaels volunteers to join a day before his tour is up. With neither the Bible-reading Michaels nor anyone else reflecting on the war itself, the players are rather thinly developed, and the plot, nominally the search for Nguyen, is weaker as a result. But personalities inexorably emerge, and it is hard not to root for individual SEALs. Wentz fought in Vietnam as a Navy SEAL and freelance writer Jurus is director of the Southern California Writers' Conference.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Kirkus Reviews

Vietnam veteran Wentz draws on his own wartime experience with the Navy's toughest commandos for an exciting, unnerving, no-frills war novel. Working in small, tight, self-contained units, the Navy's SEAL (SEa, Air, Land) commandos took on dangerous, dirty little jobs requiring stealth, strength, and flawless cooperation. Wentz and Jurus successfully re-create the manic intensity that characterized SEAL operations at their height during the Vietnam war. They follow Seaman Gene Michaels through a dozen or so operations as he serves the latter half of his first hitch in the war zone. Deeply religious, married, and soon to become a father, Gene is seen as something of a good-luck charm by the rest of his unit. As long as he has been with them, they have made it out of every hair-raising operation unscathed. Gene credits God with the safe deliveries- -until his faith is tested with the death in battle of his best friend. Popping amphetamines, the young commando goes on a sleepless 12-day hunt for the North Vietnamese colonel he holds responsible for his friend's death. The title refers to the SEALs' practice of painting their faces before their sorties, providing camouflage and scaring the wits out of anyone unfortunate enough to tangle with them. All war, no politics. Grim but well done. -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: St. Martin's Paperbacks (June 15, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312950527
• ISBN-13: 978-0312950521
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (21 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #936,061 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars This book helps the reader to "be there.", June 10, 2004

By 

"jackrabbitman" (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Men In Green Faces (Mass Market Paperback)

Only those who experience the life style of elite fighting men and women truly know what happens in the hell holes of war. This book, written by a Navy SEAL, shows the darkest battles that are not fought in the newspapers, television, or other communication media.

War is not "pretty," it is filled with subterfuge in order to win. Many people are offended by what must be done to protect freedom, but they are generally the ones who have never been on the front lines.

This scenario is real. If you want to know even a little of what really happens in war, then this is a good example. If you want the political gloss, watch TV.

I give it five stars. I've been there.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gene Wentz- A Real Seal, September 20, 2003

By 

"foofighter32" (Ohio USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Men In Green Faces (Mass Market Paperback)

My first statement is that this book is one of the best War novels ever written. I would gladly read another novel by Mr. Wentz. I would also like to say that Gene Wentz was a real navy SEAL (believe it or not)! His book is a great one. I could smell, taste, and invision every single moment of this book. It is the most dicriptive book yet it isn't boring so it keeps your attention the whole time. If you even only kinda like war novels Buy This One!
Note: Stephin King actually asked Mr. Wentz to make this book into a film but Gene turned it down because Mr. King wanted it to be Rambo style and Gene wanted to respect the men he fought besides! What a crazy guy!

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The War In Men, March 21, 2001

By 

Michael Gregory (San Diego, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Men In Green Faces (Mass Market Paperback)

From its hauntingly beautiful opening scene forward, MEN IN GREEN FACES mesmerizes. The story of Navy SEALs operating in the Mekong Delta during the war in Vietnam, I had expected this book to be just another formulaic genre account of soldiers in action. GREEN FACES proves to be far superior, both in solid, substantive storytelling and just plain gut-splitting emotion.

No doubt based in part on the real-life experiences of one of its authors, a highly-decorated former Navy SEAL, GREEN FACES features a layered cast of vibrant heroes unflaggingly determined to ply their trade--in all its lethal fury--while somehow retaining some semblance of humanity. Given the brutal, often mind-numbing conditions in which they operate, doing so proves a challenge that is never far beneath the surface. Page after page, along with each of these thoughtful young men I, too, ached and sweated and prayed for them; that they might somehow emerge unscathed from the dank heart of darkness that is jungle warfare, with all its deadly denizens--both human and not.

More than a story of men in war, MEN IN GREEN FACES is a bracing, very human story of the war in men.