Book 6) (Book VI), Close Combat (The Corps

Have been an avid WEB Griffin fan since his first book. Once you learn to skip over his detailed descriptions

in all of his books you will find that they are fast paced. Enlightening entertaining. His Army officer and Marine Corps series semi

historical.

I have never bought a new Griffin book; a younger relative passes them on. I find them mostly boring with page after page of detail which adds nothing to the plot except page count. Unfortunately, if I try to skip some boring details, I usually have to back up because I missed an important fact!
Lots of medals and promotions, but actual battle details were few and far between!
This book has a lot of useless detail but added another aggravation: sex! It's not obscene or even soft porn, mostly talking and anticipation or hopeful thinking. If I want porn, I'll buy a Nick Eastwood paperback.
This book, as well as others, would probably be a very pleasurable read if it just stuck to the plot with less than 300 pages.
I couldn't finish two Korean War stories; I consider Korea the first of many military failures.
I don't know who was inspired to display Griffin on the back cover with a cigar stuck in his face - probably the most disgusting thing about the entire book!
Norm

I just finished this book for the third or fourth time. It's been almost ten years since I last read it, and I found that this time I enjoyed it more than I remember enjoying it. I agree with the comments about all the drinking; the rapid and generous promotions; the guys always getting the girls. But reading this also made me remember how important the battle for Guadalcanal really was, and just how close we came to losing it. Griffin did a great job describing the heroic events that made victory possible. I also agree with the reviewer who states these books are too expensive. I don't understand such a high Kindle price for a book this old. the store is funny; they do so many things right. Yes the pricing decision also comes from the publisher, but I can't believe the store is unable to prevail upon them to make Griffin's older novels a little more affordable. You can get many of his books in LIKE NEW condition from hundreds of venues and pay much less..even with postage costs. Oh well. Corporate is what Corporate does.

In this,the sixth volume of The Corps series,Griffin seems to have all of his characters introduced and is now starting to utilise them in some action. The novel picks up at Henderson Field on Guadalcanal with Billy Dunn and VMF-229. The Marines are hanging on to the field (and the island) by a thread. After several battles in which the Japanese are soundly defeated,our heroes (Dunn , Jake Dillon , McCoy,Zimmerman,and "the Easterbunny") are all returned to the States. We see an expansion of Jake Dillon's role as the tour director for a War Bond tour featuring the Guadalcanal Aces and Ken McCoy's idiot brother Tommy.
The novel introduces the Guerrilla potential of Wendell Fertig on Mindinao and also the problem of the Gobi desert weather station required by the Navy and sets up the next two novels in the series,which I happen to like better than this particular episode.
I gave this particular installment 4 stars based on the character development of many of the minor characters in the series. Griffin really brings people to life--I feel as though I KNOW some of these individuals in real life. I do get a bit bored at times with "Pick" Pickering's poor little rich boy behavior,and some of the Scotch guzzling scenes get on my nerves.
In spite of these few warts,I really enjoy these books as much as any I have read. Perhaps if Griffin had given us a little more firsthand smell of gunpowder and sped things up a little more I would have rated the book 5 stars. Overall highly recommended!

I for one am truly enjoying these books set during the Second World War. Most of the battle action is set in the Pacific, and this book is set during the latter part of 1942 when the Americans were facing some real problems on Guadalcanal. Although there weren't as many battle scenes in this book as in others, it does advance us further into the war, and we really get to know the main characters. There are some surprises here. for example a very young corporal who acts very bravely on "Bloody Ridge". These books, I think, display a real pride in the United States Marine Corps. Griffin handles this tribute to a great Corps very well. And he writes wonderful stories!

Griffin pulls off what so many writers get close to but never quite seem to manage -- an authentic, if slightly romantic, portrait of the US military during the 1930s, 40s and 50s. True, many of the protagonists are wealthy, but many are not. For example, Ken Mccoy is dirt poor until he marries up. There are a lot of promotions to keep things moving, but there's also a number of guys who stay enlisted. What is captured accurately is the look and feel of serving in the pre-Vietnam US military. The Brotherhood of War and The Corps both remind me of Bernard Cornwell's series about Richard Sharpe, tracing his advancement from a Redcoat private and then sergeant in 1799 India to his elevation to Lt. of the 95th Rifles at the Battle of Assaye, and then through the Napoleonic Wars in Portugal, Spain, Denmark and ultimately Waterloo. He retires a Lt. Col., which was almost unheard of for someone raised from the ranks of the British Army, but the chronology is plausible, particularly given the wartime death rate. all in all, I go through the Griffin novels like Doritos and beer -- you can't read just one of them. He is indeed the poet laureate of the American military. Read the Sharpe books too -- you will really enjoy his ability to put you in the action of a 19th century battlefield. They also were made into a first-class series of fourteen 2-hour movies by the BBC, starring Sean Bean as a very convincing Richard Sharpe.

I picked up these books hoping to gain some insight into the actions of the Marine Corps in the Pacific during World War II. What I found instead was a sort of soap opera that rambles on for hundreds of pages without getting around to much actual fighting. For example, The Marines don't even get to Guadalcanal (their first major offensive) until the end of book III, some 1200 pages into the story. Those 1200 intervening pages are mostly conversations (ad nauseam) between stateside Marine Corps officers as they sit around headquarters, or go out on the town chasing skirts.

The small portion of the books that is devoted to actual battles is done in such a cursory fashion that you're left with the impression that the author either finds this aspect of the Marines' mission distasteful, or doesn't understand it well enough to write about it. Mr. Griffin could have deleted about 80% of his material, and would have ended up with better books, albeit still not good ones.
If you're the sort of person who likes to watch daytime soap operas, then you may enjoy these books. If, on the other hand, you're interested in military history, the banality of these books will leave you screaming in frustration.

Typical WEB Griffin Book - A great read. I have been going back and ordering the entire series so I can read them in the order that they were published as the "story lines" will make more sense... but it is not necessary however.

Enjoy, I did...