Z.O.S. – A Memoir
Z.O.S. is the story of Sex, Blood Money, and the CIA in Southeast Asia. Kay Merkel Boruff tells the story from her perspective of wife and widow of an Air America pilot killed during covert operations in Laos. She takes the reader there as only one who has been there can. You experience the highs, understand the efforts to escape the constant fear of the dangerous reality these American heroes face daily, and feel the anguish of her loss and the isolation of the “zone of silence” she is required to live in for the rest of her life.
“From a rare and reasonate point of view, Kay Merkel Boruff’s memoir offers an utterly compelling and smartly written tale of the Viet-Nam War and its aftermath. Z.O.S. is a necessary work for a full understanding of the human toll of those times.” Robert Olen Butler, Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain
About Kay Merkel Boruff (Dallas, Texas Author)
Kay Merkel Boruff lived in Viet-Nam and Thailand 1968-1970. She was married to an Air America pilot. Her 24K lifestyle was shattered when her husband was killed flying in Laos 18 February 1970. Flying home, her eyes fell on a New York Times front page headlines glaring from the coffee-stained table in the Frankfurt airport: “CIA Pilot Killed: First Casualty Plain of Jars”
The CIA pilot was her husband Jon Christian Merkel. Hours earlier she was told not to discuss Jon’s death with anyone. A fellow passenger, who knew she was an Air America wife, asked, “Anyone you knew?” She replied, “A friend.”
Kay Merkel Boruff’s memoir Z.O.S. launched August 16, 2018, with Black Rose Writing Publishers.