bio    |    profile     |    services     |    resume    |     endorsements     |   publications    |    writer's groups    |   workshops    |     contact

REVIEWS | Publications Summary | Recent Publications

DREAM BABY
Reviews and Comments


"A stunning tour de force.... Masterful interior monologues that yield eerie, tingling tension make this terrifying novel one of the most memorable chronicles of the Vietnam war."
--Publishers Weekly

"'Dream Baby is simply good fiction, deriving power from traditional fictional sources: the heroism of the nurse's character, the tension of the situation... It is powerfully metaphoric... "
--New York Times Book Review

"...a gripping supernatural Vietnam war novel..."
--Los Angeles Times

"...superb writing...riveting, emotionally-charged first-person account that moves with adventure-tale speed."
--New York Newsday

"This book is so engrossing I devoured the first third of it in a noisy, crowded cafe. McAllister has an excellent ear for speech, a good grasp of description and emotion, and he can create research notes and memos that will chill you. 'Nam novel? Yeah. Good speculative fiction? Definitely."
--San Diego Tribune

"McAllister walks in the path of such celebrated novelists as Robert Stone, Tim O'Brien and Stephen Wright--but not in their shadow. Dream Baby reads like the truth."
--Lucius Shepard, Life During Wartime

"Dream Baby is a compelling and fantastic voyage into the metaphysics of violence and spiritual transcendence of human pain. I couldn't put this novel down. It's the ultimate story of Vietnam, from the super-horror of war to the surreal dreams of the heightened imagination. McAllister's style is direct, clear, natural; his novel full of intrigue, shadows and marvel."
--Patricia Geary, Strange Toys

'McAllister is a writer of immense talents and has produced a novel head and shoulders above the competition. Dream Baby may be the definitive Vietnam novel. It is certainly the best thing I've read in years."
--Harry Harrison

"The best Vietnam novel I've ever read. It captures the combat experience as few novels do and it unmasks our 'secret war'--the one that still hasn't really been addressed. It's one of the few Vietnam novels that will last.”
--James Sandos, Intelligence Officer, US Air Force, Southeast Asia,1968-69; Defense Intelligence Agency, 1970-74

"Dream Baby is superb. Its pages ring out with the truth and I was carried back to my own 'Nam."
--Carla Bendele, Civilian Nurse, MEDAC, Republic of Vietnam, 1966-67

"I've never read a Vietnam novel with a truer feeling for combat--and the human soul in combat. I fought the war all over again in Dream Baby."
--Art Watson, IO1st Airborne Division, Republic of Vietnam