Who Shot the Water Buffalo? — Ken Babbs

Ken Babbs was the last member of the legendary Stanford writing class led by Wallace Stegner to publish a novel, and the wait was worth it. Lieutenants Tom Huckelbee ("leathery as any Texican come crawling out of the sage") and Mike Cochran ("loquacious son of an Ohio gangster") make an unlikely pair of officers training to be helicopter pilots in Vietnam. Their only aim is to get through this disorienting war without losing their minds. This is a bullet-straight story, a hallucinatory journey with a fearlessly unconventional voice. Babbs brilliantly portrays the world through the eyes of a young man discovering what it means to be beholden to another.

This novel, acclaimed as "a cross between Joseph Heller and Hunter S. Thompson" (Booklist), is a riveting and very funny exploration of war and friendship, and a book not to be missed.