Charlie and the Children

The story of Charlie and the Children is told by an enlisted man in the US Army during the Vietnam War. His whole platoon is killed one day by a booby trap set up by the Vietcong, and Charlie, the sole survivor, is taken captive by two [extremely young] North Vietnamese. They take Charlie underground, through dark tunnels, and imprison him in a pitch black dirt cell. Charlie has countless hours to think and, in the end, hallucinate from malnutrition. As he sits and waits, he remembers his platoon, his life back in the States, and the young Vietnamese woman he fell in love with and got pregnant while on his tour of duty. Joanna Scott's weaving of the story is skillful and her characterizations perceptive.
– Dan Watkins, writer for Cune Magazine

Riveting...a heart stopper...more than just another story about war. In taking on the issue of the children soldiers leave behind, Charlie and the Children transforms itself into a fable for our time. .
– Lieutenant General Lavern E. Weber

Charlie and the Children is (in novel form) a testimonial to the horrors of war anywhere – and in Vietnam particularly. An American soldier fathers a son, abandons him, disorientedly sees him in the face of a Viet Cong captor.
– Baltimore Sun Review, July 6, 1997

Here is an excerpt from the first chapter.
       That was when they took him, lying there on the path, reaching up to feel one bloodied spike. Got him there, lying amongst the bodies, in the blood, someone's brains, reaching up to feel what killed them. He didn't hear them coming and at first he could only see one of them. He was small and slight and very, very young; ten maybe, or twelve, fourteen at the outside: a boy.
       He said nothing, just flicked the end of his rifle. He was thirty at least: a man.
       He flicked the rifle again. "Up," he said.
       He was only ten after all; no more than twelve.
       Charlie stood, awkwardly levering himself off the slimy ground, keeping his eyes. . . on the face of the black-clad child in front of him.
       Their eyes met.
       Oh God, this child was a thousand years old. In his eyes were battle scars from wars older than he would ever be.

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