Customer Reviews

Victor Padrini: A Novel of the United States Air Force Academy

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

As a fellow graduate of USAFA, I can relate closely with many of the sub-plots in Victor Padrini. Perhaps that is because almost none of the stories Mr. Pizzimenti tells are fiction. Be that as it may, the author appears to express these events accurately. His criticisms of a system rife with contradictions and unfairness are right on the money.

However, anyone looking for a complete survey of the Academy will not find it here. I cannot speak for the author, but, despite many negative memories, I also benefited from the academy experience. At the academy, I learned how to leader, developed the ability to think and act under pressure, honed my time management skills, and established many life-long friendships. I also witnessed a desire of many Academy officials to make real reforms.

USAFA was certainly a flawed institution when I attended, and I wouldn't be surprised if graduates of other universities feel the same way about their alma maters. Mr. Pizzimenti's book should indeed be read by anyone considering attending one of the service academies, but they should also try to discover some of the benefits of an academy education before making a decision. The more a candidate understands the school before signing up, the less likely he or she will be to suffer from the same dilemmas of Victor Padrini.

This book is about Mark Pizzimenti's senior year at the Air Force Academy. The book is labeled as fiction, but it is only fiction in so much as the names have been changed--and in some cases the names are very similar.

It is impossible to fully appreciate this book unless you too have attended a service academy. I first read the book as a junior at the academy. I'm now a senior and the similarities between his experience and mine are striking. It is for this reason that this book should be considered non-fiction. I can find nothing in this book that doesn't happen here still, eight years later.

If one wants to find out what USAFA is all about, read the propaganda, the admissions literature, and all the rest--but definitely read this book.

I found this book extremely disappointing. No plot to speak of, and the author's jump from idealistic pre-candidate (in the italicized introduction) to bitter, cynical upperclassman (the rest of the book) was totally without transition. How'd he get there? Moreover, the author's writing style was tedious and didactic, and most of the dialogue was thinly disguised philosophical ranting. I was not surprised to read that the author wrote it in his early 20s, as it had that unmistakable "I'm a young guy infatuated with my first brush with philosophy" tinge. (Camus did it a lot better.) I also came away guessing that the author suffers from clinical depression and had a major depressive episode at the Air Force Academy (much talk of withdrawal from others, hopelessness, disillusionment, etc.), so that this was a book loosely describing one person's descent into serious depression rather than capturing the purported hypocrisy and emptiness of an institution. For those interested in good fiction about the service academies, with much better writing and some of the same themes, I would recommend (1) A Sense of Honor (James Webb); (2) The Return of Philo T. McGiffen (David Poyer); (3) Honor and Duty (Gus Lee); (4) Dress Gray (Lucian K. Truscott IV); (5) The Lords of Discipline (Pat Conroy).

I think this book revolves around one main question: Is it all worth it? Is the military experience just about playing games - whether it's at USAFA or on active duty it's all pretty much the same, just different names and slightly different situations. I guess I don't know, but the statement "none of it is worth killing or dying for" really makes me think about what's going on. I think it's the book's sense of futility that struck me the hardest. If this book is so "wrong" why have so good many people left military service?

I too am a graduate of the USAFA--Mark directed a lot of his bitterness from his experience into an excellent book that really describes the bad parts of the Academy experience. He wrote the book that most of us would be afraid to write for fear of being shunned by our fellow graduates. His writing style is very original and features some fun dialog. I have recommended this book to other grads--but not to those who did not attend. I am not certain that they would "get it".

Besides the mistakes in the typeset and the grammatical errors by the author, the story was possibly the worst I have ever read. Please do your best to ignore the ill-advised remarks on the back cover (and in the Amazon.com page for the book) made by Major Chavez; he must have owed the author a favor.

It is evident that the author has a beef he never resolved with his Academy experience, and thus he makes the reader suffer.

Please take my word as an officer in the US Air Force and a graduate of the USAF Academy, this book by no means accurately represents the Academy experience and administration. While some of his points and critiques are valid, the author blows them out of proportion with his obvious grudge. I love Amazon.com, but nobody deserves to profit further through sales of this terrible, low-quality drivel.

I had been hesitating about getting this book for some time because of some of the negative reviews, but then I finally gave in & bought it because I love service academy novels. After a few pages I knew I should have listened to those reviewers & not bothered. This book was so awful I begrudge the money I spent on it! Essentially it's one long anti-USAFA temper tantrum (very poorly) disguised as philosophical musings. The so-called philosophy is really just pretentous twaddle. A novel has to have interesting characters & a plot. This has uniformly unpleasant characters, & a weak plot that's hidden by all the stream-of-consciousness ramblings of the author/protagonist. I didn't even finish it. For good service academy novels try James Webb, Gus Lee, David Poyer, Ed Ruggero, Pat Conroy. Even Lucian Truscott IV whose books I don't really care for is better than this guy! I agree with those who said this poor excuse for a novel deserves 0 stars!

Reading this book was difficult because it brought back all that which I managed to subdue but never forget. Mark saw everything that was wrong with the Academy and pulls no punches in telling the tale. Graduates, if you have the honesty to admit that almost every aspect of your Academy experience was useless, then you can relate to Mark Pizzimenti. If you cannot admit this, perhaps you would be better off reminiscing on "knowledge bowls" and "training sessions". Everybody knows 'what they were' at the Hill. If you were 'one of them', Victor Padrini is not a book you would understand. However, I would still recommend that you read it because it may just open your eyes. As for the rest, for those who valued loyalty to your fellow man more than loyalty to the institution, Padrini is right up your alley.

Give me a break! I bought this book because I'm interested in the Air Force Academy and it is ever so poorly sub-titled "A Novel of The U.S. Air Force Academy." Yet oddly one rarely sees Victor in his day-to-day business at the academy. He's either in town getting drunk or in somebody's office spouting philosophy. Victor's character is perfect; it is only his environment that compromises his experience. He spends most of his time trying to get through the dense skulls of his superiors. This is the whining saga of a depressed, arrogant kid. If you want to read something interesting and enjoyable about one of the service academies, try The Return of Philo T. McGiffin by David Poyer.

I really enjoyed it, I couldn't put it down. I think a lot of people who went there went through the process described in the book. My favorite part of the book was the description of "no escape escapism." If this books gets negative feedback from the academy, take heart, James Webb was banned from Annapolis for four years after he wrote A Sense of Honor. He later became Secretary of the Navy. Probably wouldn't happen today a mere 10-15 years later.