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Frank Schaeffer's son John shocked his family in 1998 by going from prep school to Marine Corps boot camp "to do something different" with his life.
Frank's and John's worlds changed and then coalesced in Keeping Faith (2002), their engaging non-fiction account of Marine training from the perspective of worried dad and willing recruit.
John served in Afghanistan and Iraq. Frank followed Keeping Faith with two more military collections and, last May with Kathy Roth-Douquet, AWOL: The Unexcused Absence of America's Upper Classes From Military Service -- And How It Hurts Our Country.
In his fifth publication on the subject, prolific Frank Schaeffer returns to fiction. It's no surprise that the premise of Baby Jack is about J. Crew turning Jarhead.
Jack Rutherford Ogden joins the Marines, a decision that perplexes his affluent Massachusetts family and pierces his artist father, who believes his son is "throwing away his life."
Father turns his back on son. Son turns to girlfriend from the other side of tracks. Old-money wife turns back on husband. Son dies. Family flounders. Son's sister turns back on callous newspaper editors who seem unaware that warriors are people, too. Girlfriend realizes she is pregnant, and reader wonders whether Jack's family will ever know. Father walks in son's boot prints at training base and faces feelings.
The author lets each character speak in alternating chapters. (In heaven, Jack befriends a down-to-earth God who is a "wannabe theatre director.") The reader marvels at how Schaeffer makes this concise chorus of social conviction moving and memorable by emphasizing emotion over description.
By no means is Baby Jack another War and Peace. Think War and People instead.
Baby Jack
By Frank Schaeffer
Carroll & Graf, 299 pp., $25.95
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