I Heard My Country Calling

De: James Webb

Narrado por: George Newbern, James Webb

James Webb, author of Fields of Fire, the classic novel of the Vietnam War - and a former U.S. Senator; Secretary of the Navy; recipient of the Navy Cross, Silver Star and Purple Heart as a combat Marine; and a self-described "military brat" - has written an extraordinary memoir of his early years, "a love story - love of family, love of country, love of service" in his words.

Webb's mother grew up in poverty-stricken Eastern Arkansas. His father and life-time hero was the first of many generations of Webbs, whose roots are in Appalachia, to finish high school. He flew bombers in World War II, cargo planes in the Berlin Airlift, graduated from college in middle age, and became an expert in the nation's most advanced weaponry.

Webb's account of his childhood is a tremendous American saga as the family endures the constant moves and challenges of the rarely examined Post-World War II military, with his stern but emotionally invested father, loving and resolute mother, a granite-like grandmother who held the family together during his father's frequent deployments, and an assortment of invincible aunts, siblings, and cousins. His account of his four years at Annapolis are painfully honest but in the end triumphant. His description of Vietnam's most brutal battlefields breaks new literary ground. One of the most highly decorated combat Marines of that war, he is a respected expert on its history and conduct.

Webb's novelist's eyes and ears invest this work with remarkable power, whether he is describing the resiliency that grew from constant relocations during his childhood, the longing for his absent father, his poignant goodbye to his parents as he leaves for Vietnam, his role as a 23-year-old lieutenant through months of constant combat, or his election to the Senate, where he was known for his expertise in national defense, foreign policy, and economic fairness. This is a life that could only happen in America.

©2014 James H. Webb, Jr. All rights reserved. (P)2014 Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved.

Shouldn't narrators learn proper pronunciations?

This is a marvelous book marred by a narrator who did not confirm certain key word pronunciations. If you are going to narrate a book about a combat Marine officer's tour in Vietnam, shouldn't you know that the city of Hue is not pronounced "Hew?" There were a number of similar errors, not only of places but also of many common terms. For an author as precise and orchestral as James Webb, this must have been painful indeed. Since this narrator is not the only one with comical ideas of how to pronounce the mother tongue, perhaps Audible should vet its narrators a little more thoroughly before allowing them to have their way with an author's work. It is truly jarring. And indicative, perhaps, of the evolving Tao of Texting.

Opened the door so that I could see into my Father’s generation.

This book opened the door so that I could see into my Father’s generation. Like the author I am a combat veteran but I never understood what drove my Father to succeed until I read his book.

I had already read Fields of Fire and I saw many of the same situations and characters in the author’s experience in Vietnam as he wrote of in Fields If Fire.

This guy is great

James Webb is one of the greatest writers of the baby boomers generation . He is up there with Steinbeck and Hemingway