Book excerpt: The year is 1952. Selective Service and the military draft are uppermost in the minds of many eighteen to twenty-two year-olds. College students in good academic standing are granted deferments. Melvin Heath, a younger-ministerial student at Bradbury College has one. Driven by doubts about his ``calling to the ministry,'' Melvin drops out of college before the end of his fourth semester to join the U.S. Air Force. He sets out on a religious odyssey that takes him through military training, a rewarding tour of duty in Europe, a return to Bradbury College to resume his preparation for the seminary, disillusionment leading to a final break with Bradbury and the denomination, and his transfer to the engineering school of the state university to finish his education. His hunger for truth and understanding carries him along in his search for a resolution of the inner conflict that torments him.