Book Reviews

Title: When Whippoorwills Call
Author: John Bandy
Genre: Non-Fiction, Memoir
Reviewer: Joyce Faulkner

ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store): 0595212727

A 16 year old, high school dropout leaves home to avoid incarceration in the juvenile detention center. Using a fraudulent birth certificate, he enlists in the army, where he finds an extremely hostile environment. Seeking refuge in the army he discovers that he cannot run away from himself and the family "curse."

As a member of the United States Constabulary in occupied Germany at the end of WW2 where he faces the greatest challenges of his life amid the war torn ruins of a conquered nation.

The book describes in lurid detail the misadventures of the men in the lower ranks of the military establishment and the effects of their relationships with the German population. As a fraudulent enlistee, he lives in constant fear of being discovered. He is further plagued by premonition of doom by the family "curse," the result of a terrible sin committed by his maternal grandfather.

Born in an impoverished, dysfunctional family in the midst of the Great Depression, he struggles to overcome the indoctrination of inferiority and social ostracism, the result of his mother's alcoholism,

The story traces the family history from his ancestors' 19th century Mississippi plantation to the early 1950's in segregated Birmingham, Alabama.

Title: Mere Chance
Author: David Bancroft
Genre: Fiction, Thriller
Reviewer: Kathy Rodgers

ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store): 1482678403

We go about life everyday doing mostly what is planned or expected. Then out of nowhere something good or bad happens that changes one's life in some way, but without being consciously aware of it . . . That is "Mere Chance".

And that is what happens in Mere Chance to the brilliant, handsome Bryan Ashford in his passionate, relentless drive to succeed . . . starting with his discharge from the U.S. Army Air Corps and release from his role with the top secret Manhattan Project in 1946.

Mere Chance unfolds with a brutal brush with one of the Mafia families headed by the ruthless, deadly Angelo Martino. This episode in Bryan Ashford's life sets the stage for a subtle but relentless plan by Angelo Martino against the unsuspecting Bryan, who builds his electronics business into a world corporate power.

Intermixed with Bryan's quest for corporate success and the behind the scenes manipulation of Martino is Bryan's recall into government service for national security reasons, giving birth to political intrigue that involves the highest levels. It also adds another element to Martino's cat and mouse game with Bryan's life.

Other interesting and supporting characters add to the action that grabs the reader from the start, never letting go!

Mere Chance also gives today's younger generations a wonderful glimpse of the dedication, passion, resilience, and the other remarkable qualities of America's greatest generation as exemplified by Bryan Ashford and other characters.

Title: While the Shishi Cried
Author: J. E. "Buck" Ballow
Genre: Fiction, Mystery, Thriller
Reviewer: Mike Angley

ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store): 0741450917

Army CID Agents Eddie "Easy" Behr and Charlie Bees assist the Okinawa police in the investigation of a murder of a young girl on the back streets of Naminoue. The agents quickly find themselves involved deeply in the world of the Pink Trade, the old White Slavery practice, where young girls are lured to the island on the promise of high paying legitimate jobs. Instead they find themselves tricked and forced into the bars and the world of prostitution where they are held in economic slavery with no means of escape.

Title: Hibiscus Blood
Author: J.E. "Buck" Ballow
Genre: Fiction, Mystery, Thriller
Reviewer: Lee Boyland

ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store): 0741438860

It's not so much a mystery as it is an adventure. The CID Operations Officer drops a bomb shell of a case on Agents E.Z. Behr and Charlie Bees. After numerous robberies in the back streets of Koza, Okinawa, the latest victim has been murdered. There are no witnesses, no physical evidence, no crime scene; they don't even know the victim's name. Walk the streets with them as they resolve the puzzle their way. You develop a case of human hoof and mouth disease; you walk and talk until it all comes together.

The author retired from the US Army after twenty-eight years of service, the last fifteen with the US Army Criminal Investigation Command (CID). While in the military he spent twelve years in Japan, Korea and Okinawa. After retirement from the military he served eighteen years as a civilian supervisor of the Illinois State Police coordinatiing intelligence matters with local, state, national, and international agencies.

Title: Goodbye Yobo
Author: J.E. "Buck" Ballow
Genre: Fiction, Mystery, Thriller
Reviewer: David Tschanz

ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store): 0741445778

Captain Jared Carposi and Special Agent Edward "Easy" Behr as the new Provost Marshall and CID Chief have inherited a mess at Camp Crocket, South Korea. To make matters worse the adjacent village, nicknamed "Tombstone", has a complete disdain for law and order and is rife with prostitution, assaults, and black marketing. Worse still the village seems to be haunted by an evil spirit. As the team strives to gain control of the village a young bar girl is murdered. Were the events an omen of her impending doom? Is she now stalking the village seeking vengeance? Or is it something else? Agent Behr is a very experienced agent and a rather wily character who uses every legal, and some say questionable, trick at his disposal to resolve the problem.