Buffalo Boy and Geronimo
Published: 2006, Curbstone Press/ Northwestern University Press.
ISBN: 978-1931896191
Agent: Victoria Shoemaker
Availability: Northwestern University Press | Organic Books | Bookworks
The unique vision in Janko’s Buffalo Boy and Geronimo is the depiction of the Vietnam War as seen through the lens of a wounded but resilient nature, as a Confucian society still rooted in the earth and the unbroken fabric of ancestors is pitted against a desensitized military high-tech culture. As critic Paul Pines noted, “The forces here that seek to conquer the landscape are those, which by implication, shatter the harmonious fabric of the natural world to create a pathology that is far deeper than the political stakes indicate—one that indeed may determine the future of the entire ecosphere.”
The two heroes of the book, Nguyen Luu Mong, the Vietnamese buffalo boy, and Antonio Lucio, the US Chicano medic (Geronimo), both have a deep respect for the natural world, and it is through their eyes that we witness the devastation of the natural world of which they are a part.
Geronimo’s unit is engaged in search and destroy missions, and he becomes appalled by the pain and death inflicted on animals and humans. Eventually, he deserts and finds his way back into the jungle. Meanwhile, the young adolescent Mong loses his beloved buffalo in an early firefight and eventually sees his entire village destroyed, the survivors relocating deeper into Viet Cong territory.
Praise for Buffalo Boy and Geronimo
“…Readers who seek a complex plot won’t find it here, but the lives of the two antiheroes, U.S. Army medic Antonio Lucio “Geronimo” Conchola and 14-year-old Viet Cong villager Nguyen Luu Hai, are rendered in such rich textures that one sometimes feels Virginia Woolf is writing them.”
—Gerald Nicosia, Los Angeles Times Book Review
“In a sense, nature can be considered the protagonist of Janko’s novel, as well as its theme…Buffalo Boy and Geronimo suggests that spiritual communion with the universe will enable us to transcend our differences, be they political, racial, or societal. Janko’s novel also implies that all life should be treated with dignity and respect, and it challenges us to worship the very ground upon which we tread.”
—San Francisco Chronicle
“A beautifully written first novel about the ugliness of war—in Vietnam and anywhere else.
An anti-war novel certainly, but very much its own kind. Folkloric in approach, it’s sustained by prose that is often lyrical, though never self-conscious.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“Set in Vietnam during the war, this simple tale achieves depth through its language and naturalistic detail…This book deserves to enter the canon of masterly, penetrating works about this still controversial era. Recommended for most collections.”
—Library Journal
“…James Janko was an infantry platoon medic during the Vietnam War, one of the most perilous combat occupations of that search-and-destroy conflict. After the war, he drifted through a variety of jobs (taxi driver, strawberry picker, flower vendor) before settling in for more than a decade as a nightwatchman on Alcatraz Island…His Buffalo Boy and Geronimo provides a startlingly fresh look at that often-examined conflict with his focus on its great environmental costs through the eyes of two characters on opposing sides.”
—Seattle Post-Intelligencer