Western Sunrise is a future history, including and ending with the successful conclusion of the next Gulf War, which begins in the summer of the year 2004.

The precipitating event of that war will not be described here; it would give away too much. The technology involved is similar to that which might be featured in one of many techno-thrillers.

The narrative begins with the end of the Vietnam Conflict, touches on the Panamanian invasion of 1988, describes a Mideast assignment, Desert Shield/Desert Storm, and peacetime service in the Army Medical Department.

The realism, twists, turns, counterplots and colorful characters (such as Old Franz, the headwaiter, late of the 11th SS Armored Division, and Miss MacTavish who may or may not be an agent of MI6) make this short volume a page-turner, impossible to put down.

It is told from the viewpoint of a career military surgeon, assigned out to pasture, or so he believes, after Desert Storm, until it's time for him to retire. Except that his various mundane jobs' requirements are highly classified and contradictory. When he tries to connect the dots, he's quickly ordered not to proceed further.

Without a plausible explanation, he is kept on active duty long after his date of retirement in support of something mysterious, compartmented and unexplained until the last ten pages of the novel.

Buy it for a man who likes action-packed stories; if he likes W.E.B. Griffin, he'll love Western Sunrise