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A Patriot After All: The Story of a Chicano Vietnam Vet
 
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A Patriot After All: The Story of a Chicano Vietnam Vet [Paperback]

Juan Ramirez (Author)
5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)

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Book Description

February 1, 1999
Juan Ramirez always believed he would die in Vietnam. As a teenager growing up in the San Francisco area in the early 1960s, "Nam was there, just over the horizon, like the distant thump of artillery." His father and uncles had served in World War II, another uncle in Korea. Numerous cousins had enlisted. At nineteen, Ramirez decided to embrace the war. In 1968, the year of the Tet offensive, Ramirez joined the U.S. marines.

Two bloody tours later, Ramirez survived, but at immense cost. Twice wounded, undesirably discharged, and plagued by survivor's guilt, Ramirez surveys the toll of Vietnam on flesh and spirit in this captivating memoir.

Ramirez tells his story in a voice not often heard from the war, that of a Chicano soldier. By tracing his roots, and exploring the cultural pressures and social demons that weighed on his family and community, Ramirez offers an unflinching look at the fall and redemption of one Mexican American veteran.

�Ramirez has given us a rather unique and clear-eyed view inside the life and times and thoughts of a young Chicano who joins the marines and goes to Vietnam to find his destiny. . . . Fascinating reading.��Joseph L. Galloway, author of We Were Soldiers Once. . . And Young.


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Editorial Reviews

From Kirkus Reviews

paper 0-8263-1959-9 An introspective memoir in which the first-time author bluntly and self-critically examines his life before, during, and after his service in Vietnam. Ramirez grew up in a middle-class Mexican-American household in northern California. At 18, he enlisted in the Marine Corps, served two brutal tours in Vietnam, and came home extremely embittered. In Vietnam ``I lost almost everything I knew and believed in,'' Ramirez says. ``I lost my innocence, I lost my faith, I lost my own family, I lost my patriotism and national pride, and I lost what little self-respect I had.'' Life after Vietnam became an emotional roller coaster during which Ramirez drank and used drugs to excess, committed various crimes, and abused his wife. He also tried suicide. After many attempts at counseling, the author stopped drinking in1983, and today leads a productive life, with his own landscaping business. This redemptive story, originally written in 1986 as an undergraduate thesis, also served him as a form of much-needed therapy. ``Working on this book was a necessary spiritual journey,'' Ramirez reports, ``it wasn't just rehashing my life, it was coming to terms with my life.'' He directly addresses the darkest side of his wartime and postwar experiences, reeling off instance after instance of his own antisocial and self-destructive behavior. ``I had,'' he notes, ``many moments when I was a complete jerk and idiot.'' This seeming guilelessness is one of the book's strong points. Another is Ramirez's well-crafted section on his family and Mexican roots, a rarity among Vietnam War memoirs. He ends with a convincing plea that his serious maladjustment problems should not add to the already ``damaging myths about the Vietnam veteran.'' An unusual look at the war and its consequences. (3 photos, not seen) -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"Ramirez has given us a rather unique and clear-eyed view inside the life and times and thoughts of a young Chicano who joins the marines and goes to Vietnam to find his destiny. . . . Fascinating reading." --Joseph L. Galloway, author of We Were Soldiers Once. . . And Young.

Product Details

  • Paperback: 190 pages
  • Publisher: University of New Mexico Press (February 1, 1999)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0826319599
  • ISBN-13: 978-0826319593
  • Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.3 x 0.5 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #931,496 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Average Customer Review
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars A FIVE STAR KNOCK OUT..., May 22, 1999
By A Customer
This review is from: A Patriot After All: The Story of a Chicano Vietnam Vet (Paperback)
RAMIREZ HAS BRAVELY WRITTEN AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY PLOTTING HIS LIFE'S PILGRIMAGE FROM CHILDHOOD TO SOBRIETY. AS A TRUE AMERICAN VIETNAM WAR HERO, HIS VERY PERSONAL TALE IS INTERTWINED WITH MOMENTS OF GREAT JOY, CONFUSION ABOUT HIS HERITAGE AND SELF-IDENTITY, DESTRUCTIVE BEHAVIOR AND HIS ULTIMATE SURVIVAL. I FOUND MYSELF ENTHRALLED BY RAMIREZ' WRITING STYLE. ON MORE THAN ONE OCCASSION, RAMIREZ' PROSE AND TIMING, IN THE MIDST OF THE MOST UNUSUAL CIRCUMSTANCES, RIVALS THE BEST. EVEN THOUGH I LAUGHED AND CRIED WITH RAMIREZ, HE NEVER LOOSES SIGHT OF WHO HE IS AND RECOGNIZES MILLIONS OF WAR VETERANS FOR TAKING A SIMILAR JOURNEY.

MY HAT IS OFF TO MR. RAMIREZ FOR WRITING A POIGNANT AND COMPELLING BOOK THAT FREELY EXPOSES HIS INNER FELLINGS. HIS WILLINGNESS TO SHARE HIS LIFE, FOR GOOD AND BAD, IS TRULY STIMULATING AND INSIGHTFUL.

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5.0 out of 5 stars Wow! A real hero!, December 13, 2004
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This review is from: A Patriot After All: The Story of a Chicano Vietnam Vet (Paperback)
This is a book that needs to become a movie but a film just couldn't capture the raw truth of this man's experience. Written in retrospect A Patriot After All covers a Chicano's life from emerging from an agriculutral family, to low level working class to a family striving to become typical Americans, yet held back by the realities of rascism, discrimination and their working class background. The writer embraces his own frailty to reveal the humanity of his family trapped by Society and repressed by their own shortcomings. Through it all he continues to try and be an American and never blames America for the abuse and self abuse he faces. Wow, what a story!
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