NONFICTION : HELL NO, WE WON’T GO! <i> by Sherry Gershon Gottlieb (Viking: $21.95; 244 pp.).</i>

Gottlieb, owner until recently of A Change of Hobbit, a science-fiction bookstore in Santa Monica, is a lifelong pacifist with an enduring interest in the 25 million men who were of draftable age but did not fight in Vietnam. She has collected the oral histories of men who refused to go--to find out why they didn’t, and, often more amusingly, how they didn’t. Unfortunately, her fine passion does not suffice. Too many of the stories are brief--barely anecdotes, almost anti-war quips. The ones that stand out, like actor Richard Dreyfuss’ story of applying for conscientious-objector status, beg for more attention. The ones that don’t, like actor Chevy Chase’s quick joke about how to get out by acting like a crazy person, seem a superficial insult to the very real anguish of the time. Oral history is a deceptive discipline, requiring an interviewer who can escort her subject deeper than normal conversation might take him. Gottlieb gets some of the craziness, the manic humor, but the book is uneven and, finally, disappointing.