Preview of Dog Soldiers Summary:

"Part melodrama, part morality play," Dog Soldiers brings the Vietnam conflict home to America. Demoralized and victimized by the reality of war, the protagonist of the novel, John Converse, escapes into delusion and sophistry to negate the consequences of smuggling heroin. By illustrating the impact of the drug on the lives of his characters, Stone is acknowledging the terrifying connection between: the war and the American counterculture. As the scheme is discovered by a corrupt federal agent seeking the heroin for his own personal gain, the action of the novel flows from Saigon to Los Angeles to the California desert near the Mexican border as Converse's wife and his accomplice take flight to avoid pursuit and self-actualization.

Stone depicts a world void of decency and morality, a world marked by violence where fear has become a permanent condition of daily living. Accordingly, the only means of survival is...