WITH MY HEART IN MY MOUTH

Open apprehension and alert observation for a small-scaled account of one war correspondent's three months in the South Pacific for Time magazine. Minor marginalia, viewed against more important volumes, but it has style and a personal touch. He wanted to see what was happening over the rim in the spring of 1943, and left with the Beabe for Honolulu where he interviewed Nimitz; then by plane to a destroyer in New Caledonia, and a sampling of life aboard; a visit to the now epic beach of Guadalanal; marking time in Houses, waiting for something to happen, and finally getting it aboard a ship in the battle of Kula Gulf during the New Georgia offensive, a bloody night battle with full gunfire....Nothing much new, perhaps, but smooth reading.