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A gripping memoir of Tess Johnston's seven years on the ground during the Vietnam War. A genteel Southern belle, Tess opted for the road (much) less traveled and her account of the following seven years of living and working in Vietnam is fascinating, sometimes ribald and always fascinating. --Joseph Borich, former US Consul General, Shanghai Tess Johnston is known to many as an American denizen of Shanghai, but she has a Vietnam story that has long been waiting to be told and it is a great read. Much has been written about the Vietnam war (or the American War as they call it here), but almost none of it from the perspective of an American woman. --Fred Burke, long-term American resident of Saigon A riveting memoir of a Southern belle doing her bit to fight the war in Vietnam. Johnston gives a deeply personal and frank account of the highlights and low points of her life as a Round Eye girl in a country at war. Her openness and eye for detail make you feel you lived in country - including surviving the Tet Offensive and the death of a lover - with her. I recommended it highly. --Douglas Clark, author, Justice by Gunboat Tess Johnston clearly had the time of her life as a gutsy young staffer at the hub of US operations in South Vietnam. In this breezy memoir, she relates tales of dating pilots, hitching lifts around the Delta by chopper, and occasionally getting shot at or dodging mortar shells. Her narrative conveys the addictive buzz of discovery familiar to many Westerners in Asia, intensified by a devastating war. --Christopher MacDonald, author, The Science of War

"""A gripping memoir of Tess Johnston's seven years ""on the ground"" during the Vietnam War. A genteel Southern belle, Tess opted for the road (much) less traveled and her account of the following seven years of living and working in Vietnam is fascinating, sometimes ribald and always fascinating."" --Joseph Borich, former US Consul General, Shanghai ""Tess Johnston is known to many as an American denizen of Shanghai, but she has a Vietnam story that has long been waiting to be told and it is a great read. Much has been written about the Vietnam war (or the American War as they call it here), but almost none of it from the perspective of an American woman."" --Fred Burke, long-term American resident of Saigon ""A riveting memoir of a Southern belle doing her bit to fight the war in Vietnam. Johnston gives a deeply personal and frank account of the highlights and low points of her life as a ""Round Eye"" girl in a country at war. Her openness and eye for detail make you feel you lived in country - including surviving the Tet Offensive and the death of a lover - with her. I recommended it highly."" --Douglas Clark, author, Justice by Gunboat ""Tess Johnston clearly had the time of her life as a gutsy young staffer at the hub of US operations in South Vietnam. In this breezy memoir, she relates tales of dating pilots, hitching lifts around the Delta by chopper, and occasionally getting shot at or dodging mortar shells. Her narrative conveys the addictive buzz of discovery familiar to many Westerners in Asia, intensified by a devastating war."" --Christopher MacDonald, author, The Science of War"

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Tess Johnston has served abroad for more than half a century, including seven years in East and West Berlin and more than 40 years in Asia, 33 in Shanghai, and seven in Vietnam (1967-74). Tess moved to Shanghai in 1981 to work at the US Consulate General and in 1996, after over 30 years in the Foreign Service, retired and stayed on until her 2016 repatriation. She now writes, researches, and lectures in Washington, DC. She and her co-author, photographer Deke Erh (Er Donqiang), have published more than twenty books, including 10 volumes on Western architecture and the expatriate experience in old China.

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