One final farcical romp with the M*A*S*H Goes to... gang. As the books progressed in the series, it was pretty clear that they familiar characters (Hawkeye, Trapper, Dago Red, etc) were modeled after the TV show, rather than the original book in an effort to cash in on the TV show's popularity. But in this final book co-written with William Butterworth, politics come into play, and this ain't Alan Alda's Hawkeye. While political persons were lampooned frequently in the books, rarely was there any real leanings left or right. In this one, however, it is very clear that democrats are bad and republicans are good. Up to this point in the series, try as I might to keep my impression of the main players to what I first encountered in the original book, it was pretty much Alan Alda and Wayne Rogers in my mind. It was just jarring to read.

The final book in series, MASH Mania, dumps all the stuff in the book series after MASH Goes to Maine, and then the portrait of Hawkeye is DEFINITELY not Alda's portrayal (and it's well know that Hooker hated the TV show.) ( )