Love beneath the Napalm is James D. Redwood's collection of deeply affecting stories about the enduring effects of colonialism and the Vietnamese War over the course of a century on the Vietnamese and the American and French foreigners who became inextricably connected with their fate. These finely etched, powerful tales span a wide array of settings, from the former imperial capital of Hue at the end of the Nguyen Dynasty, to Hanoi after the American pullout from Vietnam, the Chinese invasion of Vietnam in 1979, contemporary San Francisco, and Schenectady, New York. Redwood reveals the inner lives of the Vietnamese characters and also shows how others appear through their eyes. Some of the images and characters in Love beneath the Napalm-the look that Mr. Tu's burned and scarred face always inflicts on strangers in the title story; attorney and American Vietnam War-veteran Carlton Griswold's complicated relationship with Mary Thuy in "The Summer Associate"; Phan Van Toan's grief and desire, caught between two worlds in "The Stamp Collector"-provide a haunting, vivid portrayal of lives uprooted by conflict. Throughout, readers will find moments that cut to the quick, exposing human resilience, sorrow, joy, and the traumatic impact of war on all those who are swept up in it.

The second book in the Chardin Chronicles, For Generations to Come, continues the saga of three men who must confront the consequences of their past choices and learn how those choices will determine their futures, for better or worse. After serving in the military of the Unified Territories in a war of attrition against the people of Torkos, the disillusioned Major Joe Horgon returns home ten years later to find his home irrevocably changed. There are new forces at work in the Unified Territories, forces that prove to be dangerous to Joe and his family. His neighborhood is in shambles, street gangs are the ones in charge, and Joe's wife and son are missing. Determined to find them, Joe sets out to rescue his family. Along the way, he encounters a formidable enemy. A charismatic gang leader known as the Gent has conspired with High Priest Morthuza to give gang members a serum that creates a more powerful warrior. He rules the streets and intends to wipe out any who oppose him. Joe's search brings him face to face with the Gent, and in this epic battle of wills, there can only be one survivor.

From the New York Times–bestselling author of We Were the Lucky Ones, an unforgettable story of hardship and hope, courage and resilience, that follows one young woman’s journey through war-torn Italy.

1940, Emilia Romagna. Lili and Esti have been best friends since meeting at the University of Ferrara; when Esti’s son Theo is born, they become as close as sisters. There is a war being fought across borders, and in Italy, Mussolini’s Racial Laws have deemed Lili and Esti descendants of an ‘inferior’ Jewish race, but life somehow goes on—until Germany invades northern Italy, and the friends find themselves in occupied territory.

Esti, older and fiercely self-assured, convinces Lili to flee first to a villa in the countryside to help hide a group of young war orphans, then to a convent in Florence, where they pose as nuns and forge false identification papers for the Underground. When disaster strikes at the convent, a critically wounded Esti asks Lili to take a much bigger step: To go on the run with Theo. Protect him while Esti can’t.

Terrified to travel on her own, Lili sets out on an epic journey south toward Allied territory, through Nazi-occupied villages and bombed-out cities, doing everything she can to keep Theo safe.

A remarkable tale of friendship, motherhood, and survival, One Good Thing is a tender reminder that love for another person, even amidst darkness and uncertainty, can be reason to keep going.

The greatest generation was a hardworking, strong, loving people wanting what is now called "the American Dream." Each would be propelled from their neighborhoods and slow-moving communities, a safe haven that cloaked them and held them securely, into a world war of destruction and death on December 7, 1941. America had been awakened; Americans, a year earlier, saw and understood the evil destined for this country was now killing other peoples of the world.

These were to become a volunteer group of Americans assembled by two countries, America and China, to be the first to defend an innocent people. Today they are known as the famed AVG or American Volunteer Group, the Flying Tigers. Their story is as vast as the war itself; it touched those it affected with death and destruction as it consumed everything in its path. Within the pages of this book, the story of one pilot and one nurse will be revealed, from when they volunteer, meet, fall in love, and marry while defending and saving the babies, the parents, the citizens of China and Burma. Pete and Jane maintained their beliefs of duty and honor and sacrifice while they endured the horrors of war. Finding security in each other's arms and a new spirit of love with each kiss, keeping them hopeful the war would end soon.

A story of a woman’s coming of age in war-torn Paris. Her challenges, adventures and passions.

Odette is a young, highly intelligent, headstrong Parisian woman, from a bourgeois military background. She finds herself flirting around the edges of a bohemian lifestyle during the heady days of resistance fighters and WWII. Her story takes us through her work in Paris at the French Ministry of Defence, their relocation to make way for German occupation, her meeting of an enigmatic man, her journey into a world of resistance fighters and espionage during which time she discovers the pleasures of womanhood and love.

Jean is Mauritian-born of a German father and an Irish/French mother. He is an enigma. Nobody really knows who he works for. Is he a spy or not, if so, for friend or foe? He is charismatic, a born leader and undertakes daring missions as lead of a Parisian resistance cadre. He is captured and interred at Gurs internment camp. His story takes us from Mauritius to the heart of Parisian artistes and intellectual bohemians, and to the underground resistance movement, where as a leader, he sets up escape routes for the Jews of Paris.

This is their story.

Lieutenant Jack Walker and marine Jeff Dunlay never met on American soil, even though they were both young military men in 1967. Instead, they met in Viet Nam. They didn't have much in common; military service was their strongest link. Even so, through time spent as prisoners of war, the two men became less separate, more whole.

Friendships blossom under strange conditions. For Jack's wife, Sally, and Jeff's sister, Susie, the most important men in their lives left them to fight a battle on the other side of the world. In their distress, the two women also formed a bond. When each missed her loved one, they comforted each other. They had little in common beyond the fear of loss, but it didn't matter.

"One More Sunrise" is a story of war, but it is also a story of friendships built through unlikely situations-friendships with the power to last a lifetime. Surrounded by the violence of Viet Nam, it would be easy to lose hope, but hope was all they had. Sally and Susie must await the return of their brave men; Jack and Jeff must pray for One More Sunrise.

Lieutenant Kate De Marco, an army nurse, and Captain Robert Coleman, an infantry officer, met in the Philippines in 1940. Finding themselves in one of the most romantic locations in the world, their love grew even as the winds of war threatened to drive them apart. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, their lives changed completely, as American and Filipino soldiers surrendered to the Japanese in Bataan. Kate and Robert were separated in the melee.

Evacuated to the relative safety of nearby Corregidor Island, Kate kept a diary, where she recorded her longing for Robert's safe return. Meanwhile, Robert opted not to surrender and instead swam the precarious two miles from Bataan to Corregidor in search of his love. As the Japanese threatened to take Corregidor, Kate hid her diary in the walls of an underground tunnel, where it stayed for seventy years.

In 2012, Lisa Newhouse and Brandon Wales, two graduate students from the University of Tennessee, travel to Corregidor with a study group and discover Kate's lost diary. Inspired by her words and her love for Robert, they too admit their shared feelings. Although the intersection of their lives with that of Kate and Robert is coincidence, the diary leads them on a journey, which will change their lives forever.

The year is 1968 and the Vietnam War is at its height. William Carson, a World War II veteran teaching in a small New England Prep School, has for more than two decades been haunted by nightmares whose content he has never shared with his wife, Anne, or their two sons, Joshua, a Marine on active duty in Vietnam, and Andrew, an ROTC college senior bound for active duty following graduation. When Joshua is reported missing in combat, the web of secrets and denial that has kept the family together for more than twenty years begins to unravel as Anne and William face the possible loss of their sons, and Andrew must confront the tangle of love, obligation, and loyalty that he feels toward his country, his father, his brother, his mother, and himself.
Nothing Left to Lose is a story of betrayal across generations--of fathers who send their sons to war and mothers who let them go--and the redeeming power of love and forgiveness. ----------

"In Nothing Left To Lose, the hard teachings of the Vietnam War are reflected in one family's anguished choices, and with a depth of compassion that reveals fresh meaning for us today. This beautiful and engrossing novel lets us see with fresh eyes what war-making costs the soul of a nation, and especially its men. Here we find both a chronicle of an age and a prayer for our future, perfectly tuned to this historical moment."
Joanna Macy, author of World as Lover, World as Self

"Allan Johnson's mournful yet ultimately hopeful novel captures beautifully what history textbooks always miss: that wars overseas exact enormous emotional and familial costs at home, and that for men especially, it can be just as heroic to resist wars as it is to fight in them."
Jackson Katz, Ph.D., creator of video Tough Guise: Violence, Media and the Crisis in Masculinity and author of The Macho Paradox

About the Author
Allan G. Johnson is a writer, sociologist, and public speaker who has focused most of his career on issues of social inequality. His nonfiction books have been translated into several languages and his novel,
The First Thing and the Last, was recognized by Publishers Weekly as a notable debut work of fiction in 2010 and by O Magazine as an April 2010 Great Read.

Website: www.agjohnson.com