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MWSA Review
Bob Mustin has written another fine book in The Perfection of Valor. A quick and easy read, the author writes about the events of August 29, 2005, perhaps most notable to many for the arrival of Hurricane Katrina.
However, in The Perfection of Valor, Mustin uses Katrina as one of his many subplots to pile on the stress affecting Cary Fletcher as August 29 is also the day Cary is supposed to be getting married. While the approaching storm indirectly has its affect on Cary, he is living upstate in Louisiana, and his concern is for his bride's sister still in New Orleans. The larger scenario affecting Cary is one he's had to endure since childhood, his relationship with his father, a highly decorated Marine now suffering from dementia and living in a nursing home. On the morning of the day he is to be married, Cary introduces Cornelia, his fiancé, to his father, only to have his father insult Cornelia and display his racial prejudice. On top of this, Cary discovers that his father may have hit his mother, bruising and cutting her face. The author has tossed all this on his protagonist on the day of his planned wedding. I recommend this book to everyone who enjoys literary fiction, and especially to those who might want to discover how this book ends.
MWSA Review by Bob Doerr (July 2018)
Author's Synopsis
Colonel Fletcher Hinton, USMC, retired, has had a storied career, but one aspect of his life remains wanting as his end approaches: family. Son Cary, a former Marine and now a college professor, is about to marry outside his race, and the old man, suffering a bout of dementia, insults Cary's fiancee. Too, Cary has moved his mother away from Fletcher, fearing the old man has hit her. This then is Fletcher Hinton's final contest – proving himself a good father and husband as he battles dementia and the stain that seems to tarnish his name and, through him, the Corps.
ISBN/ASIN: 987-1642556889/B07BPDRQ7S
Book Format(s): Soft cover, Kindle
Genre(s): Fiction, Literary Fiction, History
Review Genre: Fiction—Literary Fiction
Number of Pages: 208