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Bruce Otto

Loyallty, honor and duty
Complex,powerful,engrossing but important story of battles in the life of veterans.

Donald F. Costello

The Fall of the House of Richard North Patterson
I have read a few of your novels and just finished reading “In praise of Honor” now. I have some, but really very little experience with JAG work. I did serve duty as a JAG Officer at Keesler Air Force Base in Mississippi many years ago. I was mainly the go to guy who did “Yellow Pad Case Background” for the attorneys there. I also did yeoman’s work on Article 32 cases as both a defense and prosecuting attorney. I too have lot of stories about that time and one involving a good friend that was a Brigadier General, certainly not of the class of your General McCarran that you wrote about. Did you live near or fly out of McCarran airport? Is that how the name popped into your head?
I cannot in my wildest dreams imagine a set of characters who are more confused and muddled than the collection that “In Praise of Honor” presents. Not only were they almost from the “Mansion family” as Terry suggests in your book, but I can’t believe it took to the very end to wonder about Meg’s manipulative ways. “Hey, it’s a Novel” you might say but in my mind it is deeply flawed. It purports to point out the problems that came out of the Iran and Iraq wars. I am just now becoming aware of the false flag that is raised every time a new enemy supposedly rears his head.
To find out that even Terry’s father was a suicide was just over the top. I not only can’t imagine why you made the characters having such terrible backgrounds and mixed up in a plot that had to be contrived by a confused mind. I really have no way of faulting you as the hoi pulloi all rave about this as one of your best. As an old newspaper man, I am well aware what a publicist’s wallet can buy anywhere for any book.
I tried to map West Points mottoes of “duty, honor, country” into the men that made up your characters. The best I can say is that it is good to have high goals, but it is also important not to claim that Generals are top drawer when even many of the plebs know it is not so.
You never seem to recognize how sick and corrupt Meg was. It may not be criminal, but it is certainly contemptible to give Terry a little sex in turn for getting him to stay on the case while getting the Chief of Staff ( her father) to throw his weight around to get that accomplished. You did well to have Terry escape to Mexico for a rest.
Oh yes it is a novel but my variety of ethical novelist (whatever that means) would be above that kind of script writing. You seem to throw sex around as being wrapped as a new form of weaponry. Your sex scenes stink. You slip into describing Meg wink towards the bedroom and then look for a second round of sex to make things better. You would think Terry would have thought more about his case than his balls.
Once again, maybe your publicist advised this way of writing about sex.
I would advise, not that you asked for it, to break off from that Southern California background and look hard at the Midwest. Sex is the same but maybe it is just one part of the Joy of Life. It is hard to give any advice when the moral level of the whole society, coupled to the curse of addiction is bringing down a whole society.
If I thought you would listen, I would prescribe a retreat where you ask for help in trying to learn how to make life worth living.

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