Customer Reviews

Sympathy For The Devil

5 star:		(30)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This is a truly remarkable book, one that could only have been written by someone who'd experienced the madness of the Vietnam conflict and lived to tell about it. It is the most powerfully authentic of all the books I've read on the subject and succeeds because it takes us along on the transformation process. We are witnesses to how a young man discovers the seeds of primal savagery within himself and, thanks to military training, is set "free" in a fashion, to go to war. Within the context of Hanson's mindset, through his eyes, we see all that is evil and ugly simultaneously externalized and internalized. In Hanson's war there is a scalding justice that is meted out on those who are arrogant, or stupid, or in the wrong place at the wrong time, or who are too young to comprehend the training they've received (or victims of its inadequacy.) Death is everywhere, pointless yet necessary to satisfy a general's need for another star for his epaulettes; to vanquish an enemy it's too often impossible to recognize. The sights, the smells, the reek and feel of torn earth, torn bodies, the melting death of an Agent Orange landscape, invade the reader's senses; with lyrical force we are taken with Hanson through the madness that is his soldier's life and, ultimately, becomes ours.

A powerful tour-de-force, this book is peerless, an absolute must-read for anyone with the least curiosity of what too many young men faced eight thousand miles from everything familiar, and what those who survived brought home to relive in their day- and nightmares forever.

Kent Anderson can really write. I mean, it's good that he's writing from experience, and it's good that he's chosen such important subject matter, but the main reason Sympathy for the Devil is such a good book is simply that Anderson knows what he's doing so completely.

This book covers Anderson's Army Special Forces protagonist, Hanson, through boot camp and two tours in Vietnam. The sequel, Night Dogs, is about Hanson in his job as a police offier after the war. I highly recommend them both, but if you don't feel like buying the pair, Sympathy for the Devil stands alone just fine.

The only caveat is that the book is pretty well hashed up into a series of anecdotes, incidents, and short-story-length pieces. It's a detailed account, but it's out of sequence and light on context. As far as I'm concerned, that makes it even stronger, but I've talked to people who disagreed, so I mention it here. If you're looking for a Vietnam book that's more orderly and educational, I suggest something by James Webb, who seems to have quite a bit of the journalist in him, or one of the oral-history books, like Nam.

But Sympathy for the Devil is really a beauty. It doesn't so much try to be a book on The War, like those others, but it gets ahold of you, it easily keeps you reading, and it really does make you think-- and not about foreign policy or the military's conduct in Vietnam or anything like that. It's more about the things Hanson tries, the lengths he goes to, in dealing with the Army and the enemy.

I don't say this often, but this is one of the very best books I've ever read.

Kent Anderson has given me what I've been looking for in a VietNam book. It's as good as James Crumley's One To Count Cadence, butwith more combat. Where Going After Cacciato wandered through a dreamlike, surrealistic landscape, Sympathy trudges through the brutal terrain of realism. Sure, the facts are a bit off...but this is presented as a work of fiction. It seems like that's the best approach if you want to tell the absolute truth about some of the brutalities of war. The only flaw I found here was the small segment dealing with the return to the States. The prose flowed much more naturally( as well as more believably) when Hanson(the lead character) is actually in Viet Nam. I already own Anderson's Liquor, Guns & Ammo...Sympathy has guaranteed that I will soon own Night Dogs. Anderson has an amzing eye for detail and handles dialogue rather smoothly. This one will knock the air right out of you, but when you get your breath back your first word will be MORE! Dennis McMillan has published some of Anderson's work, deservedly placing him in the company of masters like James Crumley, Charles Willeford, and other hard-boiled craftsman. Anderson writes about war without losing you in the terminology. There wasn't a single part of the book where I couldn't figure out what he was talking about. It's as easy to read as it is ugly. Crumley's introduction is as good as the actual book. He also lists several other excellent books of the genre for you to explore.

The book, Sypathy for the Devil, is about as honest a book as I have ever read. This is not a book about what a "great Killer I am". This simply tells the story of a man that changed in Vietnam because he had to to survive. Anderson is just telling readers how the war really was. I have read this book six times and highly recommend it for those who have been in the service, are in the service, or who will be in the service.

I have just finished reading this book, or parts of it, for about the 10th time. The first time I read it, it disturbed me with it's frankness and detail. (I'd bet that not many people other than vets know that you have to start a gas engine to fire a quad fifty in the field.) Other similar details will escape those not familiar with the jargon and slang of the Army at war. I was fascinated, not having heard some of those words in more than 30 years. (MOGAS, LAW, AO, SOG) He precisely captures, with this detail, the very essence that no one other than a vet could. The opening sequence, much praised, of "Saving Pvt Ryan" pails in comparison. I wonder when some screen writer is going to snatch this one up as the defining novel of the "Vet-Nom" war.

I was privileged to have attended several of Mr. Anderson's fiction classes while attending the University of Texas at El Paso. During that time I got a chance to hear him read from various chapters of this book as he was writing it. The result is astounding. Read this one and then read "Night Dogs" the sequel and you'll see a clear portrait of a man who has been to hell and lived to write about it.

BRAVO!

Having just read this book and the Illiad, the similarities are readily apparent. The callousness, brutality, and combat addiction of Hanson and his Green Beret teammates are as timeless as the effects of war on Achilles, Hector, and the rest of the warriors of the 2,000 year old classic. That's what is so great about this book; despite the vast change in the technology, methodology, and reasons behind war, its effects on the human psyche are the same. Many previous reviews knock the book for its geographical or chronological inaccuracies; but this book is not a memoir of Vietnam, it is a profound statement on violence and what it does to us. Sympathy for The Devil really made me think about the Special Forces guys out on the front lines in Afghanistan, and how they and their families are adapting when they rotate home.

I was just blown away with this novel. It was truly an experience in opening one's eyes to the horror of war and just what the men must of went through over there in Vietnam.
Kent Anderson has a unique writing style that really gives you the sense of what went on over there back in the 60's and 70's, leaving you feeling everything from shock to mind-numbing pain. Moments of sheer happiness to deepest despair is where Mr. Anderson will take you in this journey.
This is a must read for those who want to get not only a great read, but want to get a glimpse of the hell of war and it's aftermath.

I first read this book while serving in the U.S. Army and in fact picked it up at a small book store in Hohenfels training area in Germany.

Since then, I've had to buy three copies because friends would not return the book.

Its most noticeable strength is the voice in which it is written, and this may be its only flaw as well. For those who have served in the military (with perhaps the exception of REMFs) the dialogue sounds SO real that one might expect Hanson/Anderson had kept a diary/tape recording of his entire experiences and then simply transcribed the novel. This same plus for soldiers and veterans might be a minus for civilians who might have trouble wading through the jargon and whose senses of humour have not been warped by Uncle Sam.

His depiction of the unique society found within the military is dead on.

The book is at once funny and tragic. You sympathize and empathize with the characters easily.

I have a degree in English and am an author mys! ! elf now, and with all honesty and apologies to the likes of Grisham and Clancy, Kent Anderson is the only author I'd ever really care to meet.

The book is hard to find,and I am personally searching hard for a hardcover version, because my latest paperback copy is wearing out quickly.

Let me first state that overall it is a very quick, adrenaline pumping read about a small Green Beret unit, outposted far in enemy controlled territory, and the missions that this small unit goes on. The book follows our `hero' Hanson from the end of his first tour, through his insane trip back to the states, and ends during his second tour in Nam. It centers, basically around Hanson and his two friends, as they basically hang out in their camp, go on occasional and terrifying patrols, fight fellow soldiers, etc. If you like the typical Vietnam paperback then you will love this book...If you are easily turned off by guts, gore and too much testosterone then you should avoid this one.
Overall I enjoyed this book, having only one major complaint. I feel the author rushed an ending that doesn't fit with the rest of the book. It almost seems like he was ready for the book to be over and so he kills off a couple of the main stars and has the `hero' annihilate some nva AND an entire American company and then fly off into the sunset. Despite this quick and unlikely ending it is a book that you more than likely will enjoy...although I still have no sympathy for the Devil.