The Lords of Discipline

Product Description

This powerful and breathtaking novel is the story of four cadets who have become bloodbrothers. Together they will encounter the hell of hazing and the rabid, raunchy and dangerously secretive atmosphere of an arrogant and proud military institute. They will experience the violence. The passion. The rage. The friendship. The loyalty. The betrayal. Together, they will brace themselves for the brutal transition to manhood... and one will not survive. With all the dramatic brilliance he brought to The Great Santini, Pat Conroy sweeps you into the turbulent world of these four friends - and draws you deep into the heart of his rebellious hero, Will McLean, an outsider forging his personal code of honor, who falls in love with a whimsical beauty... and who undergoes a transition more remarkable then he ever imagined possible.

From Library Journal

For the listener who can persevere beyond the barrage of crude language used by most of the male characters in author Conroy's humane look at life inside a Southern military academy, the producer offers a stunning audio version of a popular work of modern American fiction (published first in 1980). The star of this production is narrator Tom Stechschulte, who provides an amazing array of nuanced voices, even making each of the several native Charleston characters distinctive by his intonation. By turns, Conroy holds up military ideals and savages the often brutal treatment of military school recruits. At once starkly realistic and lyrical, Conroy's diffuse prose ultimately lulls the listener into the rhythms of its episodic tide of plot devices. The sound quality of this unabridged audio book is supurb, as is the pacing and cover design. Highly recommended.?Mark Pumphrey, Polk Cty. P.L., Columbus, N.C.

Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About the Author

Pat Conroy is the bestselling author of The Water is Wide, The Great Santini, The Lords of Discipline, The Prince of Tides, Beach Music, The Pat Conroy Cookbook, My Losing Season, and South of Broad. He lives in Fripp Island, South Carolina.

From AudioFile

No matter what his narrative gifts, when it comes to overwrought writing, Pat Conroy need not bow to any contemporary novelist. His excesses, though, are a reader's opportunities, and Stechschulte rises to the occasion. Conroy gives Stechschulte plenty of room for dramatic flourish, for soaring soliloquy, for indulgent melodrama. But that's not the end of Stechschulte's bag of acting tricks. He creates an astonishing array of distinctive characterizations, from aristocratic Southern belles to poor New York City ethnics to crusty, unyielding military officers. Between Conroy and Stechschulte, we are treated to a charged, involving saga about a young man's coming of age as he confronts corruption and brutality at a Southern military school. M.O. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Chapter One

When I crossed the Ashley River my senior year in my gray 1959 Chevrolet, I was returning with confidence and even joy. I'm a senior now, I thought, looking to my right and seeing the restrained chaste skyline of Charleston again. The gentleness and purity of that skyline had always pleased me. A fleet of small sailboats struggled toward a buoy in the windless river, trapped like pale months in the clear amber of late afternoon.

Then I looked to my left and saw, upriver, the white battlements and parapets of Carolina Military Institute, as stolid and immovable in reality as in memory. The view to the left no longer caused me to shudder involuntarily as it had the first year. No longer was I returning to the cold, inimical eyes of the cadre. Now the cold eyes were mine and those of my classmates, and I felt only the approaching freedom that would come when I graduated in June. After a long childhood with an unbenign father and four years at the Institute, I was lookin