Vietnam Journal: Series Two #7

Book excerpt: Don Lomax's critically acclaimed Vietnam Journal series returns with all new stories. THIS ISSUE: "CHILDREN OF THE DUST" - Murphy's Law: Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong. 'Journal' and his fledgling photographer, Lindsey, follow the 11th Armored Cavalry into Cambodia on the heals of President Nixon’s 1970 incursion into South Vietnam’s fragile neighbor, itself on the verge of civil war. Suddenly they are lost and unprotected. The brutality and horror they are forced to witness sets even Neithammer, a seasoned war correspondent, on his heals as the blood sodden countryside fights back against the insult of war and mayhem. They discover of a wiry, headstrong Nun named Emily in the aftermath of a battle. She in searching the burned-out hulks of a destroyed South Vietnamese armored column. They find her blessing the dead and then robbing them of any scraps of food available in order to feed the starving children of the orphanage she and her fellow Nuns maintain in the middle of the war. 'Journal' and Lindsey join her, in the beginning, simply because she has a truck and 'Journal' is tired of walking. But soon they are involved in the very survival of the war’s most vulnerable, and fragile victims.