Booklist
This odd but not dull volume could be subtitled A Yuppie in the Foreign Legion. A yuppie is precisely what Salazar was, with a probable fast-track career before him, when he took advantage of being in Paris to join the legion. He survived the grinding, even brutal training, and for some while he also survived his comrades. They were the lost and the lonely from all over Europe, especially the less salubrious parts of it, and Salazar admits to having never been quite comfortable with them, for all the legion's tight camaraderie. He also suspects that they were never quite comfortable with him, nor too unhappy when he deserted to return to his business career, able to say that he had proved something about himself to himself and to write a useful sketch of the contemporary legion and the mercenary scene in general, for readers interested in either information or thrills. Roland Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Présentation de l'éditeur
Since 1831, the French Foreign Legion has been a renowned fighting force. It gives men a new lease on life-and a chance to test their physical and mental limits. In 1999, that's just what American Jaime Salazar was looking for.
The son of underpaid Mexican immigrants, Jaime earned a degree in mechanical engineering from Purdue. But at twenty-three, he was disillusioned with the corporate fast track. So he became an outcast American in a hard-bitten group of recruits-men on the run from their pasts, men without hope: He joined the French Foreign Legion.
From the Legion's notoriously brutal training to Salazar's fierce competitiveness, ultimate disillusionment and dramatic desertion, Legion of the Lost is a compelling, firsthand account of today's French Foreign Legion that will dispel myths while adding to the legend of the finest trained army of warriors the world has ever known.
The son of underpaid Mexican immigrants, Jaime earned a degree in mechanical engineering from Purdue. But at twenty-three, he was disillusioned with the corporate fast track. So he became an outcast American in a hard-bitten group of recruits-men on the run from their pasts, men without hope: He joined the French Foreign Legion.
From the Legion's notoriously brutal training to Salazar's fierce competitiveness, ultimate disillusionment and dramatic desertion, Legion of the Lost is a compelling, firsthand account of today's French Foreign Legion that will dispel myths while adding to the legend of the finest trained army of warriors the world has ever known.
