Tuesday, Dec. 17, 2013 • Former superintendent’s novel recounts Vietnam experiences

Publisher’s note: This story originally appered in the Tuesday, Dec. 17, 2013 edition of the Lassen County Times.

Bob Owens, the former superintendent at the Lassen County Office of Education, has written a new novel based on the year he served as a medic during the Vietnam War.

Owens talked about his book, “Pointman,” and shared photographs taken in Vietnam in 1970 during the Wednesday, Dec. 4 noon Rotary Club meeting.

After graduating from college, Owens said he and a friend volunteered for the draft, a decision they almost immediately began to reconsider.

After his service in the U.S. Army, Owens said he recorded many of his memories in a diary that later served as the basis for a true historical account in a book he wrote. As he worked through several drafts of the non-fiction book, he said the stories were alternately boring and exciting, so he instead decided to write a novel based on his experiences.

Although he received good comments on the novel from publishing insiders in the 1970s, he was unable to find a publisher. Over the years he continued to revise and polish his work.

Recently working through a literary agent — a process that wasn’t in place during the 1970s when novels could be submitted directly to editors or readers at publishing houses — Owens finally found a publisher and the book came out earlier this year.

According to a review in the East Oregonian published in September, “This book has it all: love and hate, fear and courage, revenge and redemption. It’s an in-your-face, dirty, ugly, no-holds-barred look at an unpopular war that was those things and more. ‘Pointman’ is not for the faint of heart; the language and imagery are stark, blunt and unvarnished. For a brutally honest look at one man’s Vietnam experience, pick this one up.”

Owens said the book has sold out on Amazon, but copies are available here in Susanville at Margie’s Book Nook.