Politician's Memoir...20 years early, September 19, 2005
Reviewer: Salty Tex "Salty Tex" (Texas and California) - See all my reviews
The author was in my battalion but this is not personal. I approached it as if he was a civilian, as his web site shows with his black turtleneck. I got the book this weekend, digested it, and read parts again today. I will try to keep this short but it's hard; we all heard about Lt Fick's huge book deal and I have waited for this counterpoint to Generation Kill since those Rolling Stones articles hurt our reputation. But the fact is I learned more about Lt Fick in Rolling Stone than I did in his own memoir.
Generation Kill was written about the same platoon (It was no accident the Rolling Stone writer hooked up with a LT who himself wanted to make a name) but was shocked to find I actually enjoyed 'Kill' much better. It angered the hell out of me but it was a page-turner. As the reviews say, this is notcolorful. More than that, its meant to be safe and it's actually boring. No new ground is covered. The combat is sparse. It seems calculated. Lt Fick once told Rolling Stone that Afghanistan was
"The incompetent leading the unwilling to do the unnecessary" So i expected some funny insights or at least true feelings. Instead, I got one of those books a politician writes before a campaign. What are the author's real feelings? No clue except for snetences that could be pulled from a bio.
My main question; what did the publisher pay for? Though the author says it's no big deal he went to dartmouth (a main point is that he was a volunteer like the rest of us) if you look at the jacket and all the reviews, one of the huge selling points he uses is that he was IVY LEAGUE. And SPECIAL FORCES. Huh? So they bought a memoir 20 years before he runs for office..and the thing is there really isn't much here compared to OIF II. Every careful crafted sentence is meant to check a box. But i didn't get an inside look at a platoon whose bad side was exposed so well/badly by Rolling Stone. The author skips all the real drama and chooses master-of-the-obvious. By remaning at 10,000 feet it seems planned from the moment he joined the Corps, as if he was an embed instead of a Marine.
I wish the author nothing but the best and hope he takes care of the Corps when he's a senator, but he's written this life memoir too early...a composite of many other Marine memoirs without the serious combat but with all the seriousness of an "educated man" who dips his toe in the water and then writes an essay about oceangoing. I'm sure civilian reviewers may love this; he's one of them, a thinker with a heart...but also salt-of-the earth. Right? But the fact is the author should have gone back as an XO in OIF II and he never would have written some things he did. And the perspective about combat would have been totally different. If he wrote at all.
