R&R

Description

John 'Nashville' Grant is an American military policeman in the R&R town of Vung Tau, tucked safely behind the front lines of the Vietnam War. Nashville knows how everything works- the army, the enemy, bars, secrets, men and women. He's keeping the peace by keeping his head down and making the most of it. His new partner is a tall man from a small town- Shorty, from Bendigo. Shorty knows nothing about anything, and he wishes people would stop mistaking that for stupidity. When another MP shoots a corpse in a brothel, the delicate balance between the military police, South Vietnamese gangsters and the Viet Cong is upset. Nashville and his partner are drawn into the heart of the matter by their violent colleague Sergeant Caution, the obsequious landlord Moreau, the improbable entrepreneur Izzy Berger and the mysterious, omnipotent Mamasan. Events begin to force the pair to uphold the law and eventually to take it into their own hands. 'Mark Dapin is a true original.' Christos Tsiolkas 'Forget whatever film you've seen or book you've ever read about Vietnam because Mark Dapin's R&R will blow your mind away. Apocalypse Now meets Good Morning Vietnam, R&R is hilarious, poignant and incredibly powerful. Believe you me, this is a bloody masterpiece.' Rob Minshull, ABC Queensland

Mark Dapin is the author of the novels King of the Cross and Spirit House. King of the Cross won the Ned Kelly Award for Best First Fiction, and Spirit House was long listed for the Miles Franklin Literary Award and shortlisted for the Age Book of the Year and the Royal Society for Literature's Ondaatje Prize. His recent work of military history, The Nashos' War, has been widely acclaimed. He is a PhD candidate at the Australian Defence Force Academy.

PRAISE FOR MARK DAPIN'S NOVELS: 'A little masterpiece of comedy and torment.' The Australian, 'Book of the Year' 'Every now and then you can run across a writer who does a little magic. They take something that almost everyone thinks they know something about, re-examine it from a completely unexpected direction and present the reader with a whole new take on their expectations ...Mark Dapin has pulled off a deeply human, but particularly Australian, bit of magic.' Courier-Mail 'Every other week, it seems, a fine new Australian novel is published. Few, however, can equal the vernacular flair, the originality of treatment of matters that we had thought overly familiar and the narrative drive of Mark Dapin's Spirit House ...Dapin is funny, poignant, vibrantly witty and his novel is a treat from its elegiac opening to its bitter, unexpected close.' Canberra Times 'A literary cocktail of rare originality. It is not hard to see why Mark Dapin's stylish novel, set in Nineties Sydney, was such a critical success in Australia. The writing has real freshness ...the story glides effortlessly from an intriguing start to a heart-warming resolution ...Dapin impresses with the understated authority of his storytelling.' Daily Telegraph, UK