Book List

There are hundreds, if not thousands, of books written about the Vietnam War. They range from memoirs to academic studies to government accounts. Find what you're looking for here.

National Archives photo no. 5891333

The books below will be sorted by nonfiction and fiction. Within those categories, books will be further sorted by topic, where applicable.

Inclusion on this list does not equal an endorsement.

Nonfiction

Memoirs

Arbuckle, Les	Saigon Kids: An American Military Brat Comes of Age in 1960's Vietnam
Boyd, Robert B., Jr.	Alone in Vietnam
Boyle, Jerome	Apache Sunrise
Brennan, Matthew	Brennan's War: Vietnam 1965-1969
Caputo, Philip	A Rumor of War
Clark, Johnnie M.	Guns Up!: A Firsthand Account of the Vietnam War
Collier, Bill	The Adventures of a Helicopter Pilot: Flying the H-34 in Vietnam for the USMC
Collier, Bill	CIA Super Pilot Spills the Beans: Flying Helicopters in Laos for Air America
Cornett, Alan	Gone Native: An NCO’s Story
Davis, Tom	The Most Fun I Ever Had With My Clothes On: A March from Private to Colonel
Dinh, Nguyen Thi	No Other Road to Take: Memoir of Mrs Nguyen Thi Dinh
Donovan, David	Once a Warrior King: Memories of an Officer in Vietnam
Downs, Frederick	The Killing Zone: My Life in the Vietnam War
Elkins, Frank	The Heart of a Man: A Naval Pilot’s Vietnam Diary
Ellsberg, Dan	Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers
Estep, James	Company Commander Vietnam
Fair, Joe	Call Sign Dracula: My Tour with the Black Scarves, April 1969 to March 1970
Flanagan, John F.	Vietnam Above The Treetops: A Forward Air Controller Reports
Garcia, Manny	An Accidental Soldier: Memoirs of a Mestizo in Vietnam
Halliday, John T.	Flying Through Midnight: A Pilot’s Dramatic Story of His Secret Missions Over Laos During the Vietnam War
Harrison, John	Steel Rain, the Tet Offensive 1968
Heard, Barry	Well Done, Those Men: Memoirs of a Vietnam Veteran
Hemphill, Robert	Platoon: Bravo Company
Johnson, Tom	To the Limit: An Air Cav Huey Pilot in Vietnam
Jones, Bill	The Body Burning Detail: Memoir of a Marine Artilleryman in Vietnam
Jorgenson, Kregg P.J.	Acceptable Loss: An Infantry Soldier’s Perspective
Kautz, Barbara	When I Die I’m Going to Heaven ‘Cause I Spent my Time in Hell (A memoir of my year as an Army Nurse in Vietnam)
Kerrey, Bob	When I Was a Young Man: A Memoir
Ketwig, John	…and a hard rain fell: A GI’s True Story of the War in Vietnam
Klutz, Diane	Round Eyes: An American Nurse in Vietnam
Kotcher, Joann Puffer	Donut Dolly: An American Red Cross Girl’s War in Vietnam
Kovic, Ron	Born on the Fourth of July
Krizan, Jerry and Robert Dumont	BAC SI: A Green Beret Medic's War in Vietnam
Lanning, Michael Lee	Vietnam, 1969-1970: A Company Commander’s Journal
Lanning, Michael Lee	The Only War We Had: A Platoon Leader’s Journal of Vietnam
Laurence, John	The Cat from Hue: A Vietnam War Story
Lazzarini, Tony	Highest Traditions: Memories of War
Lennox, Bob	Everything I Never Wrote Mom… About the US Army and Vietnam
Leppelman, John	Blood on the Risers: An Airborne Soldier’s Thirty-five Months in Vietnam
Linderer, Gary	Eyes Behind the Lines: L Company Rangers in Vietnam, 1969
Marlantes, Karl	What It Is Like To Go To War
Marvicsin, Dennis J. & Jerold A. Greenfield	Maverick
Mason, Robert	Chickenhawk
McGowan, David	Delta Shotgun
McNamara, Francis Terry	Escape with Honor: My Last Hours in Vietnam
McPartlin, Greg	Combat Corpsman: The Vietnam Memoir of a Navy Seals Medic
Mills, Hugh L. Jr.	Low Level Hell
Ogden, Richard	Green Knight, Red Mourning
O’Brien, Tim	If I Die in a Combat Zone: Box Me Up and Ship Me Home
Page, Tim	Derailed in Uncle Ho’s Victory Garden: Return to Vietnam and Cambodia
Rasimus, Ed	When Thunder Rolled: An F-105 Pilot over North Vietnam
Reilly, Thomas L.	Next of Kin: A Brother’s Journey to Wartime Vietnam
Ronnau, Christopher	Blood Trails: The Combat Diary of a Foot Soldier in Vietnam
Sever, Al	Xin Loi, Viet Nam: Thirty-one Months of War: A Soldier’s Memoir
Sevier, Elisabeth	War Without A Front, The Memoirs of a French Army Nurse in Vietnam
Smith, Winnie	American Daughter Gone to War
Spencer, Ernest	Welcome to Vietnam, Macho Man
Tang, Troung Nhu	A Vietcong Memoir: An Inside Account of the Vietnam War and Its Aftermath
Teglia, Kenneth F.	Lamb in a Jungle: Conscience and Consequence in the Vietnam War
Thi, Lam Quang	The Twenty-Five Year Century: A South Vietnamese General Remembers the Indochina War to the Fall of Saigon
Tolle, Michael E.	A Spear-Carrier in Viet Nam: Memoir of an American Civilian in Country
Tonsetic, Robert	Warriors: An Infantryman’s Memoir of Vietnam
Tram, Dang Thuy	Last Night I Dreamed of Peace: The Diary of Dang Thuy Tram
Van Devanter, Lynda	Home before Morning: The Story of an Army Nurse in Vietnam
Van Zanten, William	Don’t Bunch Up: One Marine’s Story
Ward, Joseph T.	Dear Mom: A Sniper’s Vietnam
Ware, Ezell and Joel Engel	By Duty Bound: Survival and Redemption in a Time of War
Winter, Ronald E.	Masters of the Art: A Fighting Marine’s Memoir of Vietnam
Young, Paul	First Recon-Second to None: A Marine Reconnaissance Battalion in Vietnam, 1967-68

Oral History and Letters

Adler, Bill	Letters from Vietnam: Voices of War
Appy, Christian G.	Patriots: The Vietnam War Remembered
Appy, Christian G.	Vietnam: The Definitive Oral History Told from All Sides
Currey, Cecil Barr	Long Binh Jail: An Oral History of Vietnam's Notorious U.S. Military Prison
Edelman, Bernard	Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam
Fawcett, Bill	Hunters & Shooters: An Oral History of the U.S. Navy SEALs in Vietnam
Gioglio, Gerald R.	Days of Decision: An Oral History of Conscientious Objectors in the Military During the Vietnam War
Herman, Jan K.	Navy Medicine in Vietnam: Oral Histories from Dien Bien Phu to the Fall of Saigon
Lanning, Michael Lee	Tours of Duty: Vietnam War Stories
Rushton, Patricia	Vietnam War Nurses: Personal Accounts of 18 Americans
Santoli, Al	Everything We Had: An Oral History of the Vietnam War As Told by 33 American Men Who Fought It
Santoli, Al	To Bear Any Burden: The Vietnam War and Its Aftermath in the Words of Americans and Southeast Asians
Taylor, K.W.	Voices from the Second Republic of South Vietnam (1967–1975)
Terry, Wallace	Bloods: Black Veterans of the Vietnam War: An Oral History
Vang, Chia Youyee	Fly Until You Die: An Oral History of Hmong Pilots in the Vietnam War

General History

Appy, Christian G.	Working-Class War: American Combat Soldiers and Vietnam
Appy, Christian G.	American Reckoning: The Vietnam War and Our National Identity
Asselin, Pierre	Vietnam's American War: A History
Asselin, Pierre	Hanoi’s Road to the Vietnam War, 1954-1965
Asselin, Pierre	A Bitter Peace: Washington, Hanoi, and the Making of the Paris Agreement
Blang, Eugenie M.	Allies at Odds: America, Europe, and Vietnam, 1961–1968
Bosiljevac, T.L.	SEALs: UDT/ SEAL Operations In Vietnam
Bowden, Mark	Hue 1968: A Turning Point of the American War in Vietnam
Bradley, Doug and Craig Werner	We Gotta Get Out of This Place: The Soundtrack of the Vietnam War
Braestrup, Peter	Vietnam as History
Braestrup, Peter	Big Story: How the American Press and Television Reported and Interpreted the Crisis of Tet 1968 in Vietnam and Washington
Broughton, Jack	Thud Ridge: F-105 Thunderchief Missions Over Vietnam
Broughton, Jack	Going Downtown: The War Against Hanoi and Washington
Butler, David	The Fall of Saigon: Scenes from the Sudden End of a Long War
Catton, Philip E.	Diem's Final Failure: Prelude to America's War in Vietnam
Chapman, Jessica M.	Cauldron of Resistance: Ngo Dinh Diem, the United States, and 1950s Southern Vietnam
Daddis, Gregory A.	Withdrawal: Reassessing America's Final Years in Vietnam
Daddis, Gregory A.	Westmoreland's War: Reassessing American Strategy in Vietnam
Daddis, Gregory A.	No Sure Victory: Measuring U.S. Army Effectiveness and Progress in the Vietnam War
Demery, Monique Brinson	Finding the Dragon Lady: The Mystery of Vietnam's Madame Nhu
Drury, Bob and Tom Clavin	Last Men Out: The True Story of America's Heroic Final Hours in Vietnam
Duiker, William J.	Ho Chi Minh: A Life
Dunstan, Simon and Michael Sharpe	Airborne In Vietnam: 1st Cavalry in Vietnam and 101st Airborne in Vietnam
Emerson, Gloria	Winners & Losers: Battles, Retreats, Gains, Losses, and Ruins from the Vietnam War
Fall, Bernard	Hell In A Very Small Place: The Siege Of Dien Bien Phu
Fall, Bernard	Street Without Joy: The French Debacle in Indochina
FitzGerald, Frances	Fire in the Lake: The Vietnamese and the Americans in Vietnam
Freedman, Dan and Jacqueline Rhoads	Nurses in Vietnam: The Forgotten Veterans
Freeman, Gregory A.	Sailors to the End: The Deadly Fire on the USS Forrestal and the Heroes Who Fought It
Greiner, Bernd	War Without Fronts: The USA in Vietnam
Gruhzit-Hoyt, Olga	A Time Remembered: American Women in the Vietnam War
Hackworth, David H.	Steel My Soldiers’ Hearts: The Hopeless to Hardcore Transformation of U.S. Army, 4th Battalion, 39th Infantry, Vietnam
Halberstam, David	The Making of a Quagmire: America and Vietnam During the Kennedy Era
Halberstam, David	The Best and the Brightest
Hamilton-Merritt, Jane	Tragic Mountains: The Hmong, the Americans, and the Secret Wars for Laos, 1942-1992
Herring, George C.	America’s Longest War: The United States and Vietnam, 1950-1975
Hirsch, James S.	Two Souls Indivisible
Jacobs, Seth	Cold War Mandarin: Ngo Dinh Diem and the Origins of America's War in Vietnam, 1950-1963
Jacobs, Seth	America's Miracle Man in Vietnam: Ngo Dinh Diem, Religion, Race, and U.S. Intervention in Southeast Asia
Jorgenson, Kregg P.J.	Very Crazy, G.I.!: Strange but True Stories of the Vietnam War
Jorgenson, Kregg P.J.	MIA Rescue: LRRPs in Cambodia
Jorgenson, Kregg P.J.	LRRP Company Command: The Cav’s LRP/Rangers in Vietnam, 1968-1969
Jorgenson, Kregg P.J.	The Ghosts of the Highlands
Karnow, Stanley	Vietnam: A History
Kendrick, Alexander	The Wound Within: America in the Vietnam Years, 1945-1974
Krohn, Charles A.	Lost Battalion of Tet: The Breakout of 2/12th Cavalry at Hue
Kurlantzick, Joshua	A Great Place to Have a War: America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA
Langguth, A.J.	Our Vietnam: The War 1954-1975
Lanning, Michael Lee	Inside the LRRPs: Rangers in Vietnam
Lanning, Michael Lee	Inside the Crosshairs: Snipers in Vietnam
Lanning, Michael Lee and Dan Cragg	Inside the VC and the NVA: The Real Story of North Vietnam’s Armed Forces
Lanning, Michael Lee and Ray W. Stubbe	Inside Force Recon: Recon Marines in Vietnam
Lawrence, Mark Atwood	Assuming the Burden: Europe and the American Commitment to War in Vietnam
Lawrence, Mark Atwood	The Vietnam War: A Concise International History
Lawrence, Mark Atwood and Fredrik Logevall	The First Vietnam War: Colonial Conflict and Cold War Crisis
Lee, Alex	Utter’s Battalion: 2/7 Marines in Vietnam, 1965-66
Lembcke, Jerry	Hanoi Jane: War, Sex, and Fantasies of Betrayal
Lemcke, Jerry	The Spitting Image: Myth, Memory, and the Legacy of Vietnam
Levinson, Jeffrey L.	Alpha Strike Vietnam: The Navy's Air War, 1964 to 1973
Logevall, Fredrik	Choosing War: The Lost Chance for Peace and the Escalation of War in Vietnam
Logevall, Fredrik	Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America’s Vietnam
MacLear, Michael	The Ten Thousand Day War: Vietnam 1945-1975
MacPherson, Myra	Long Time Passing: Vietnam and the Haunted Generation
Mangold, Tom and John Penycate	The Tunnels of Cu Chi: A Harrowing Account of America’s Tunnel Rats in the Underground Battlefields of Vietnam
McKenna, Thomas P.	Kontum: The Battle to Save South Vietnam
McMaster, H.R.	Dereliction of Duty: Johnson, McNamara, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies That Led to Vietnam
Michel, Marshall L.	The Eleven Days of Christmas: America’s Last Vietnam Battle
Michel, Marshall L.	Clashes: Air Combat over North Vietnam, 1965-1972
Miller, Edward	Misalliance: Ngo Dinh Diem, the United States, and the Fate of South Vietnam
Moore, Harold G. and Joseph L. Galloway	We Were Soldiers Once…and Young: Ia Drang - The Battle That Changed the War in Vietnam
Moore, Harold G. and Joseph L. Galloway	We Are Soldiers Still: A Journey Back to the Battlefields of Vietnam
Murphy, Edward	Dak To: America's Sky SOldiers in South Vietnam's Central Highlands
Newman, Rick and Don Shepperd	Bury Us Upside Down: The Misty Pilots and the Secret Battle for the Ho Chi Minh Trail
Nguyen, Lien-Hang T.	Hanoi’s War: An International History of the War for Peace in Vietnam
Nichols, John B. and Barrett Tillman	On Yankee Station: The Naval Air War over Vietnam
Nicosia, Gerald	Home to War: A History of the Vietnam Veterans' Movement
Nolan, Keith William	Search and Destroy: The Story of an Armored Cavalry Squadron in Viet Nam, 1/1 Cav, 1967-1968
Nolan, Keith William	Sappers in the Wire: The Life and Death of Firebase Mary Ann
Nolan, Keith William	Ripcord: Screaming Eagles Under Siege, Vietnam 1970
Nolan, Keith William	Operation Buffalo: USMC Fight for the DMZ
Nolan, Keith William	The Magnificent Bastards: The Joint Army-Marine Defense of Dong Ha, 1968
Nolan, Keith William	Into Laos: The Story of Dewey Canyon II/Lam Son 719, Vietnam 1971
Nolan, Keith William	Into Cambodia: Spring Campaign, Summer Offensive, 1970
Nolan, Keith William	House to House: Playing the Enemy's Game in Saigon, May 1968
Nolan, Keith William	Death Valley: The Summer Offensive, I Corps, August 1969
Nolan, Keith William	The Battle for Saigon: Tet 1968
Nolan, Keith William	Battle for Hue: Tet 1968
Norman, Elizabeth	Women at War: The Story of Fifty Military Nurses Who Served in Vietnam
Oberdorfer, Don	Tet!: The Turning Point in the Vietnam War
Palmer, Dave R.	Summons of Trumpet: U.S.-Vietnam in Perspective
Plaster, John L.	SOG: The Secret Wars of America’s Commandos in Vietnam
Robbins, Christopher	Air America: The Explosive True Story of the CIA's Secret Airline
Robbins, Christopher	The Ravens: The True Story Of A Secret War In Laos, Vietnam
Sallah, Michael and Mitch Weiss	Tiger Force: A True Story of Men and War
Scruggs, Jan C.	Why Vietnam still matters: the war and the wall
Shaw, Geoffrey	The Lost Mandate of Heaven: The American Betrayal of Ngo Dinh Diem, President of Vietnam
Shay, Jonathan	Achilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma and the Undoing of Character
Sheehan, Neil	A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America in Vietnam
Shultz, Richard H., Jr.	The Secret War Against Hanoi: The Untold Story of Spies, Saboteurs, and Covert Warriors in North Vietnam
Smith, George W.	The Siege at Hue
Stanton, Doug	The Odyssey of Echo Company: The 1968 Tet Offensive and the Epic Battle to Survive the Vietnam War
Stanton, Shelby L.	The Rise and Fall of an American Army: U.S. Ground Forces in Vietnam, 1963-1973
Stanton, Shelby L.	Rangers at War: LRRPs in Vietnam
Stewart, Geoffrey C.	Vietnam's Lost Revolution: Ngô Đình Diệm's Failure to Build an Independent Nation, 1955-1963
Stur, Heather Marie	Beyond Combat: Women and Gender in the Vietnam War Era
Summers, Harry G.	On Strategy: A Critical Analysis of the Vietnam War
Thi, Lam Quang	Hell in An Loc: The 1972 Easter Invasion and the Battle That Saved South Viet Nam
Turse, Nick	Kill Anything That Moves: The Real American War in Vietnam
Valentine, Douglas	The Phoenix Program
Veith, George J.	Black April: The Fall of South Vietnam, 1973-75
Wells, Robert	The Invisible Enemy: Boobytraps in Vietnam
Westheider, James E.	Fighting in Vietnam: The Experiences of the U.S. Soldier
Westheider, James E.	The African American Experience in Vietnam: Brothers in Arms
Wiest, Andrew	Rolling Thunder in a Gentle Land: The Vietnam War Revisited
Wiest, Andrew	Vietnam's Forgotten Army: Heroism and Betrayal in the ARVN
Wiest, Andrew	The Boys of ‘67: Charlie Company’s War in Vietnam
Wilcox, Fred A.	Waiting for an Army to Die: The Tragedy of Agent Orange
Wilcox, Robert K.	Scream of Eagles: The Dramatic Account of the U.S. Navy’s Top Gun Fighter Pilots and How They Took Back the Skies Over Vietnam
Willbanks, James H.	The Tet Offensive: A Concise History
Willbanks, James H.	The Battle of An Loc
Willbanks, James H.	A Raid Too Far: Operation Lam Son 719 and Vietnamization in Laos
Willbanks, James H.	Abandoning Vietnam: How American Left and South Vietnam Lost Its War
Woodruff, Mark	Unheralded Victory: The Defeat of the Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese Army, 1961-1973
Zaffiri, Samuel	Hamburger Hill: The Brutal Battle for Dong Ap Bia, May 11-20, 1969
Zhai, Qiang	China and the Vietnam Wars, 1950-1975

Photography and Art

Adams, Alyssa and Eddie Adams, Hal Buell	Eddie Adams: Vietnam
Buchanan Sherry and David Heather	Vietnam Posters: The David Heather Collection
Buchanan, Sherry	Vietnam Zippos: American Soldiers’ Engravings and Stories (1965-1973)
Buchanan, Sherry	Tran Trung Tin: Paintings and Poems from Vietnam
Buchanan, Sherry	Mekong Diaries: Viet Cong Drawings and Stories, 1964-1975
Daugherty, Leo J. and Gregory Louis Mattson	Nam: A Photographic History
Griffiths, Philip Jones	Vietnam Inc.
Page, Tim	Tim Page's NAM
Tam, Pham Thanh and Sherry Buchanan	Drawing Under Fire: War Diary of a Young Vietnamese Artist

Document Collections

Hunt, Michaeal H.	A Vietnam War Reader: A Documentary History from American and Vietnamese Perspectives
Lawrence, Mark Atwood	The Vietnam War: An International History in Documents
McMahon, Robert	Major Problems in the History of the Vietnam War: Documents and Essays

Reference

A Vietnam War Chronology : According to Military Assistance Command Vietnam (MACV) Records	Romine, Randall M.	ISBN 1588989593
Dictionary of the Vietnam War	Olson, James S.	ISBN 0313249431
Encyclopedia of the Vietnam War	Kutler, Stanley I.	ISBN 0132769328
Historical Atlas of the Vietnam War	Summers, Harry G.	ISBN 0395722233
In Country: Illustrated Encyclopedia of the Vietnam War	Olson, James S.	ISBN 1435111842
The Encyclopedia of the Vietnam War [4 volumes]: A Political, Social, and Military History, 2nd Edition	Tucker, Spencer	ISBN 1851099603
The Vietnam War Almanac	Summers, Harry G.	ISBN 0891416927
The Vietnam War: A Chronology of War	Bluhm, Raymond K., Jr.	ISBN 0789318970
Vietnam Order of Battle: A Complete Illustrated Reference to U.S. Army Combat and Support Forces in Vietnam 1961-1973	Stanton, Shelby L.	ISBN 0811700712
Vietnam War Almanac	Willbanks, James H.	ISBN 0816082480
Where We Were in Vietnam: A Comprehensive Guide to the Firebases and Military	Kelley, Michael	ISBN 1555716253

Fiction

Campolo, Joe, Jr.	The Kansas NCO
Goswitz, Robert	The Dragon Soldier's Good Fortune
Gould, T.L.	How Can You Mend This Purple Heart
Greene, Graham	The Quiet American
Hasford, Gustav	The Short Timers
Hasford, Gustav	The Phantom Blooper
Huong, Duong Thi	Paradise of the Blind: A Novel
Huong, Duong Thi	Novel without a Name
Johnson, Denis	Tree of Smoke: A Novel
Marlantes, Karl	Matterhorn: A Novel of the Vietnam War
Morris, Michael and Dick Pirozzolo	Escape from Saigon
Myers, Walter Dean	Fallen Angels
Ninh, Bao	The Sorrow of War: A Novel of North Vietnam
O'Brien, Tim	The Things They Carried
O'Brien, Tim	Going After Cacciato
O'Nan, Stewart	The Vietnam Reader: The Definitive Collection of Fiction and Nonfiction on the War
O’Neill, Susan	Don’t Mean Nothing: Short Stories of Vietnam
Webb, James	Fields of Fire