North Sar: A Novel of Navy Combat Pilots in Vietnam

This impressively detailed and highly suspenseful technothriller is set in 1972, when the carrier pilots flying against North Vietnam and the senior officers who send them out have long since lost any illusions that victory can be reached. What remain are professional pride and fighting man's courage--qualities that lead all ranks to take awesome risks to rescue pilots downed in enemy territory. At the cutting edge are the helicopter crews of North Sea Air Rescue. Lt. Tim Boyle flies a Sea King rescue chopper; his closest friend, Mike Santy, is in charge of an A-7 Corsair. First novelist Carroll, a veteran rescue pilot with extensive Vietnam experience, uses Boyle, Santy and task force commander Rear Admiral Welch to put readers on the flag bridge and the flight deck, and in the ready room and wardroom of the U.S.S. Concord . Deftly manipulating an understated prose, Carroll balances descriptions of strike and rescue missions into the North with an empathetic analysis of command problems at the end of a lost war. This auspicious debut stands in good comparison with Flight of the Intruder as a fictional portrait of naval air operations in Vietnam. (Dec.)