HIPPIES: A Kent State Love Story

by Peter Jedick

Hippies is a fictional love story set on the campus of Kent State Univesity during the fateful year of 1969–'70, the same year four students were killed by the Ohio National Guard during an anti-Vietnam War demonstration. It follows the exciting exploits of four male roommates who unwittingly share an off-campus duplex with four female roommates, including the main character's ex-girlfriend. The book is filled with fun, passion, and adventure against the backdrop of the Vietnam War. It shows how the times shaped their views and how events beyond their control shaped their personalities. The wild times come to a sobering halt during the tragic weekend of May 4th, 1970. Hippies has been extremely popular with both the baby boomer generation and today's college students.

Genres: Fiction

317 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 1, 2001

Reviews

[Aggie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a great book. I loved it! It gave me the hippie fiction fix that I was craving. Told in the first person point of view, Matt Kubik is a senior at Kent State University, trying to beat the draft and stay sane in an insane world that is full of political protests, the growing anti-war sentiment, free love and lots of drugs. He and his friends make the most of their last year, having fun and trying not to think of being sent to Nam. Matt is a lovable dumbass, funny and sarcastic. He is trying to juggle two chickies while pondering life after Kent. His voice is what I loved about this book. And the crazy adventures he and his dudes have. The ending of HIPPIES is a wallop and will stick with me for a long time. I highly recommend this book to Baby Boomers or anyone interested in historical hippie fiction or hippies in general, or anti-war views.

[Linsey · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a current Kent State University graduate student, when I stumbled upon this book, I was intrigued and decided to read it. After completing this historical fiction novel, I now understand a little bit more about the the time period of the 1970 Kent State shooting and the anti-Vietnam War climate on a college campus.

Not only did this novel provide me with historical background to the terrible May 4, 1970 tragedy, but it gave insight to what it may have been like to live during that time, as it follows the life of a handful of KSU undergraduates in their senior year. Will the men in this friend group be drafted to Vietnam? How did the Vietnam draft even work? I was amazed to learn how the draft was done— every birthday was drawn randomly and given an order to be drafted. I highly recommend reading this novel to learn more about this historical disaster.

[Franco Vite · Rating 4 out of 5]

Eh che diamine! :)
Anche il nostro paese ha avuto il suo movimento Hippies, e Matteo Guarnaccia, in questo bellissimo libro, ci fa da Virgilio nella scoperta di questo poco conosciuto momento storico.
E' un fiume carsico, il movimento "freak" italiano, che inizia negli anni '60, grazie ad alcuni illuminati personaggi (vedi di M. Philopat, I viaggi di Mel, Shake Edizioni), per crescere a dismisura negli anni '70, per poi tornare sottoterra dagli '80 in poi (underground, appunto).
Ma non tutto è finito, abbiate fiducia...

[Catherine · Rating 2 out of 5]

My God, the spelling and grammatical errors! One of my students "borrowed" my much-marked up copy (I couldn't resist the editing) and never returned it.

[Robin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Descriptions of the town and campus are spot-on but the story is trite.

[Sogarlene · Rating 5 out of 5]

It took me a minute to get in the headspace to listen to life from the perspective of college kids. 😂 I kept thinking how my son Max would start HS years saying in history this year we are going to get to more current history - meaning the 50s 60s and 70s. Then they would never make it that far in the book.

THIS is the book that should be read to learn about the Vietnam protest era. It lazily meanders through the carefree nature of life and slowly the signs of unrest enter. You experience the beginnings of the movement, the tension between kids and their parents, the various perspectives of college students, the first protests, the Nixon draft process, and the spiraling angst. The Kent State atrocity happens in the final minutes of the book.

This book reminds me of advice my last history prof at OSU back in the 80s gave on day one of the class as we all pondered the syllabus and the historic fiction books included. He said as soon as class ends sell back your textbooks. They are out of date before they are published. But keep your novels. That’s where you will learn history. Best History class I ever took. ❤️ This is an example of the novels he was telling us to keep.

I hope we learn to listen to the kids. They will lead us in the right direction… if we let them.

[Rick · Rating 4 out of 5]

You didn't have to have gone to Kent State in the 1960s to appreciate this book. But I DID. I was there from 1965 to 1967. However I was gone by the time the famous May 4 shooting took place. I was enrolled in another university down state when I heard about it. At the time I thought the shooting was inevitable. This book is somewhat entertaining, mostly about college life in those days, and how everything went wrong when protests against the war in Vietnam took place.

[Kali · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great read to kill some time, especially if you are having an itch for something that holds themes of college and friendship or social revolutions. Slow at first, and was not too pleased with the main character, however I kept reading and decided it was well worth sticking with it.

[Dan Prusak · Rating 4 out of 5]

good read I could relate!