Can Tho

4.5/5 ( ratings)

Thus begins this story of war and love that is "Can Tho A Story of love". Full of fascinating characters like Sgt. Little, the lanky black sergeant who runs the dispensary in the middle of the Mekong Delta while he plans how to be the first black soldier at the Surgeon General's Office; Cesar, the talented but womanizing medic who plans to marry a virgin but falls for a bar girl; Ly, the Cambodian hootch maid who falls in love with a preppy soldier who never returns; Be, the bar girl turned nursing student; and Roman and Huong, he the unassuming but dedicated soldier; she the beautiful and quite nationalistic lab tech whose love weaves throughout this story of quiet heroism, heart wrenching tragedy and military frustration. This is not your typical foul-mouth Viet Nam novel full of raunchy sex and men with no moral outlook except to complain about their commanders and the unfairness of war. Instead, it is a story of men and women, American and Vietnamese, who cope with tragedy, have aspirations, survive and fall in love. Yes, there are the combat scenes, bars and prostitutes, disgruntled draftees, arrogant officers, but there are also the kind and selfless soldiers, some who give their lives for their fellow men, and the Vietnamese men and women who have complicated lives and are not just a casualty of war. More important, there is hope and there is love despite the tragedy of so much violence and suffering. It is a part of the story of Viet Nam that rarely gets told. It is a soft and sensitive love story.