Marine Sniper

Carlos Hathcock lived in Virginia Beach. That's one of the reasons I picked up this book after watching a History Channel show about snipers. One of my friends met him several years ago and told me a little bit about Hathcock. I wanted to know the human element of story and the book didn't disappoint me too much there. Its obvious in the reading that the author had an agenda. To his credit, he admits it up front. He is making the case for the Corps to maintain sniper units at a time when their future may have been in doubt. But Marines make better snipers than writers and the book is pretty choppy. His attempts at real descriptive prose some times hit the mark, but often feel forced and unnecessary. It does give a feel for what this type of combat was like for those men who practiced it in Vietnam and it doesn't spare the gory details. The Kindle version was less than $10 and it was worth that.