Lizzie's War -- Doing Justice to Vietnam Vets and Their Families

Beginning at age 20, Tim Farrington, author of May Book Sense Pick Lizzie's War (HarperSanFrancisco), worked for 10 years as a dishwasher, followed by another decade as a house-cleaner. He also wrote several unpublished novels along the way.

"It was a lot of self-therapy," Farrington explained, "a very long exploratory apprenticeship. I'm sure there are much more efficient ways to do it." No matter the path he took, Farrington has certainly arrived at his writerly destination: in addition to Lizzie's War, he's the author of The Monk Downstairs (a July/August 2002 Book Sense Top 10 Pick) and two previous well-received works of fiction, plus a crime novel written under the name Frank Devlin.

Tim Farrington

When BTW caught up with Farrington, he was fresh from an author-photo shoot in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. He said the experience had been surreal, in part, because the photographer has a close connection to a man he greatly admires. "Bernard Fall wrote interesting and profound books, including Hell in a Very Small Place," explained Farrington. "It was one of the books I used in doing research for Lizzie's War -- and the photographer was his daughter Elizabeth! It was so extraordinary to have her there.... I felt I should be taking her picture."

Extraordinary is a good word, too, to describe Lizzie's War, with its detailed and gripping descriptions of battle, and the way it believably and honestly conveys Lizzie's simultaneous longing for and anger at her Marine-officer husband. She, at home with their four children (and pregnant with a fifth), feels out of place among the military wives in the neighborhood and longs to return to the acting career she set aside upon the onset of motherhood. Her inner turmoil is palpable, and her attempts to maintain her sanity and strength are by turns funny and familiar, touching and troubling.

After all, Farrington noted, "Lizzie married Mike for his strength, but she didn't understand how it would manifest itself ... that he'd be cheerfully ready to die for his country."

Although readers, too, may be unable to imagine themselves possessing that sort of cheer, Mike's letters to Lizzie -- and the decisions he makes as he leads his men -- provide important insight into the sort of person who might, say, choose to stay in battle, even if an injury gives them the opportunity to leave a place of great danger and return to the safety of home.

Farrington drew inspiration for the Mike character from the stories told by his own father. Farrington was, like Lizzie's children, a "Marine Corps brat," and his father fought in Vietnam. "I cobbled a lot from his letters -- I pulled a lot of direct quotes and really well-put details," said Farrington.

Mike's attitudes echo Farrington's father's, too: "He really had that old-school approach, 'this is my job, to risk my life for my country.'"

That exposure to Marine culture drove Farrington's quest to write a well-researched, meaningful book. "A bunch of my best friends' dads were in the Marines, too ... and at my church [now], there are a number of Vietnam veterans I totally love. It makes you want to get it right when you see what [their experiences] mean to those guys. I was determined to do them justice."

Farrington's resolve is physically embodied by his two-inch-thick file, dating back 18 years, of ideas, sketches, notes, and quotations (there's one at the beginning of each chapter) for Lizzie's War. "[The book] felt enormous to me ... it covered a bigger canvas, and I consciously committed to it. It's so close to my heart, the theme of sacred vocation, of finding your calling in the world."

Farrington initially worried that readers might not be able to relate to the book. However, he said, "I think the country is ready now for a sympathetic picture of a military in the midst of a dubious war. With Vietnam, all the ambivalence about the war got dumped on the fighters. Now, everyone pretty much thinks our guys are great. There's more sympathy for the military."

The dark humor in Lizzie's War is a wry counterpoint to the characters' worries about war. Memorable scenes include the spectacularly understated moment in which the local Bluebird Troop is integrated and Lizzie's flash of clarity about her seeming insanity (set against a tableau of backyard bunkers, canned hot dogs, and a green parrot).

Farrington takes only partial credit for these bursts of brilliance. "In every book so far, I've set out with a certain idea, and 60 to 70 pages in, the book begins to gently assert itself in direction and tone," he explained.

Although it's a pattern that has become familiar, Farrington said, "It's fairly traumatic, like a plateau. I know what's working, I can hear the tone of what's working, and I have to let go of my precious ideas. It's the emergence of something different than conscious intention, and it has to be honored or the juice goes out of it." He added, "Writing, for me, is mostly listening -- being receptive, when the sentences are singing along."

It is this listening that makes Farrington's writing-journeys not unlike the reading-journeys of those who pick up his books. Regarding two major elements of the book's ending, he said, "It breaks your heart, doesn't it? I never saw it coming!" and "It surprised me, too!"

He said the same about his other occupation -- that of Sunday-school teacher. "After 15 years of Buddhism and Hinduism -- I lived in a commune, and in an ashram for a while -- I now teach Episcopalian Sunday school a mile down the road from where I lived in fourth grade. Wow, didn't see that coming!"

What he does see coming next, though, is work on a nonfiction book, A Hell of Mercy, which Farrington characterizes as a meditation on the relationship between depression, spirituality, and psychiatry. He'll likely write another Frank Devlin novel, too, and pay visits to his neighborhood bookstores in Virginia -- Prince Books in Norfolk and Broad Street Books in Ghent.

On May 18, Farrington will begin a tour in support of Lizzie's War. He'll visit nine states, with stops at bookstores, BEA, and ALA. Although he didn't enjoy such events at first (one memorable reading of The Monk Downstairs became "a huge group-therapy session; the audience tried to work through it with me"), Farrington said, "Now I actually love readings. They're like stand-up comedy."

In and among stand-up reading gigs, Farrington said, he's scheduled his time so he can continue his practice of working in the mornings. "Being at a table for hours calms me down...it maintains my equilibrium," he said, adding, "Writing a novel keeps me off the streets for a wonderfully long time, like a sea voyage. It suits my temperament." --Linda M. Castellitto