“The Camp Clovis Chronicles 1969” is narrated by M. Chris Polo as he recounts his memories of the summer of 1969. After he graduates high school he takes a summer job at a remote summer camp in the mountains of California. There he meets up with a handful of insane characters- all stuck in the twilight zone of life- not knowing if they will wind up in Vietnam, whether by choice or the draft. As Polo ’s summer progresses the exploits and attitudes of the crazy camp staff are revealed in each chapter. A tapestry of life in 1969 is carefully reconstructed through zany recollections of that summer. As the staff s celebrates Neil Armstrong being first man to walk on the moon they believe the future is hopeful. The future should look bright but it doesn’t. Their future is uncertain, as every night on the news they see the body count of how many Americans died in Vietnam that day. But author Polo reveals the early sixties was just as insane as they survived their younger public school years practicing “duck and cover” drills each week under the endless threats of total nuclear war. The had all been witness to events like The Cuban Missile Crisis, the shootings of both John and Bobby Kennedy, Martin Luther King, the Watts Riots and Atomic Bomb testing. They were the Atomic generation, which were born from the end of WW2 to the early 1950’s. After surviving all that now they would have to survive the end of the sixties. The humor of the book is often cynical but always on target with the times. If you were there or not, The Camp Clovis Chronicles 1969, will reveal another time in America, some fifty years ago that was just as insane as today. Maybe nothing really ever changes, we just grow older and forget.
“The Camp Clovis Chronicles 1969” takes you on a hilarious journey into Americas past.