Chapel Hill, NC: Algonquin, 1989. dj. Hardcover first edition - The highly acclaimed first novel by this firefighter from Oxford, Mississippi. The devastating tragedy that was the war in Vietnam is made vivid in the stories of two men, one black, one white, both born and raised in Mississippi, and both badly wounded in Vietnam, who lie in hospital beds next to each other, and talk. ISBN: 0-94557-5203.