Summary

Sam drives to the mall and begins reading through her father’s journal. At first it is difficult to read and the entries are dry descriptions and geographical notations, but then a few pages in they turn into journal entries. It describes him fighting and ready to kill the V.C. Her father refers to the Vietnamese people as ‘gooks’, a racial slur. And is excited to be fighting and killing. He describes a scene where they find a dead V.C. and it smells different than a rotting white person. Other soldiers were taking teeth to keep as tokens and adding a notch in their machetes. Dwayne was disappointed he didn’t have any notches yet.

Analysis

Sam is disgusted and disappointed by what she finds in the journal. At first she is excited to be learning so many details about what the...