DEFICIENT

About the Book

From the fear of a Japanese invasion of the West Coast after Pearl  Harbor, to the intense hazing as a plebe at West Point, to the bitter cold on the long march to the Yalu River during the early days of the Korean War, to the midnight scramble to the Czech border duting the Cuban Missile crisis, Bob Hayes lived through it all.  Then came a shock to his very being, a dubious dismissal from the  Army leading him, his wife and their five children into a troubled world of unemployment, alcohol, drugs, foreclosure and mental illness. This is the heart-wrenching story of a highly intelligent, immensely likeable West Point graduate's long, slow descent into a personal hell from which he never escaped.

About the Author

John Gess retired after a number of years working at Microsoft Corporation. He is the son of a West Pointer, a ‘49er, and spent five years in the Army himself, serving in Germany. This is his second book, the first was a story about a German soldier serving on the Russian Front, called A Simple Soldier. He lives near Seattle, Washington.