Old Man
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- USD 8.99
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- USD 8.99
Descripción editorial
A trip with his estranged father changes Nate forever.
Commended for the Popular Paperback Young Adults Pick, 2014 and short-listed for the Forest of Reading - White Pine Award for Fiction, 2014
Just as summer vacation is about to arrive, Nate Huffman’s plans are unexpectedly shelved for the most unlikely of reasons: the reappearance of his estranged father. Not only is the old man back, he’s got this goofy idea about a road trip the two of them will take.
Nate finds himself in a pickup with a man he can’t stand. His father wants to reconnect, and he wants Nate to really understand him. Larry Huffman has chosen to make this happen by taking his son into his own past, which has the Vietnam War as its centrepiece.
As the two struggle their way through the jungle of the Ashau Valley, the old man relives the horror of the battle that changed him forever, and Nate undergoes changes of his own – and they experience something that goes far beyond what either of them expected.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This snappy, affecting YA-centered novel by Canadian teacher and author Poulsen (Numbers) is a skillful rendering of an estranged father who feels compelled to reconnect with his son. Sixteen-year-old Nate Huffman is firming up his summer vacation plans when his dad, Larry, 62, phones to say he wants "to spend some time together." Nate feels angry and resentful since Larry ran off 11 years earlier with a much younger woman, leaving Nate and his mother behind in Alberta. Larry divulges that they're heading to Saigon, characterizing their junket as a "buddy movie" where Nate "might learn something." En route, Larry reveals elements of his colorful past to Nate and the pair stop over to visit Larry's "strange" Vietnam War buddy, Tal Ledbetter. Once in Vietnam, Nate is awed as Larry takes him on a tour of wartime Vietnam that climaxes in a harrowing side trip into the jungle. Father and son bond as Larry explains to Nate what being a soldier taught him about manhood and life. Nate also has his first date with a girl, Jen Dodsworth, an Australian tourist visiting Vietnam with her parents. Poulson handles heavy material with sophistication and as the excursion winds down, his young protagonist learns the hardest truths about love and death.
