A TIME OF KILLING

Another submarine story from the author of Submarine Wolfpack (1961) underlines his concern with the questions faced by the men aboard, here with Captain McGuire and his apathetic crew, five weeks out of Midway, three on patrol out of Nagasaki. Not knowing if the war is over but sure the end is near and with no Japanese shipping to be seen, McGuire's men grow keen when a bombing by plane and ship whet them for revenge when three of their men are killed. Orders take them to the Manchurian end of the Yellow Sea with the information about the drop on Hiroshima and Nagasaki following them, and McGuire is put to the test when a helpless Jap ship comes on target. Its sinking, the rescue of an officer and his subsequent retaliation, show McGuire that, although the enemy may be a human being, war has no code decreeing mercy -- and that it is no place for nice guys, philosophers or moralists. The man who knows guilt pitted against the man of hostility, of mechanical obedience, of acceptance, is here ably, arguably presented. A decided masculine appeal.