Fallen Angels by Walter Dean Myers

It’s 1967 and American boys are enlisting to fight in Vietnam. Young Richie Perry just graduated from high school, but he feels lost and unsure about what to do with his life. Thinking the military will keep him out of trouble, he enlists. Richie and his group of soldiers are deployed immediately to the jungles of Vietnam. They believe the war will be over very soon and don’t plan to see much action; however, they are dropped down in the middle of a war zone and discover the war is nowhere near being finished.

Richie discovers the horrors of war: landmines, the enemy lurking in spider holes and murky swamps, the accidental shooting of soldiers in your own platoon, burned out villages full of old people and toddlers and the children who are strapped with bombs and sent amongst the American soldiers.