When Herald Lloyd, an attorney and family man, learns he's been cursed with a catastrophic legal-malpractice lawsuit, his recurring Vietnam War nightmares flood his daytime consciousness, and he medicates his post-traumatic stress with alcohol.

He was reckless to quit college to join the Army. Mocking the war, he bought a GI Joe Coloring Book and half-gallon of whiskey, for a drunken send-off with his fraternity brothers. Vietnam hurls Herald into becoming a decorated combat platoon leader, commanding stressed oddballs and misfits like Dogman, who walks point and only barks...