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Title details for Thank You for Your Service by David Finkel - Available

Thank You for Your Service

by David Finkel
Arthur Bishop
Audiobook
1 of 1 copy available
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1 of 1 copy available

Now a Major Motion Picture Directed by American Sniper Writer Jason Hall and Starring Miles Teller
No journalist has reckoned with the psychology of war as intimately as David Finkel. In The Good Soldiers, his bestselling account from the front lines of Baghdad, Finkel embedded with the men of the 2-16 Infantry Battalion as they carried out the infamous "surge". Now, in Thank You for Your Service, Finkel tells the true story of those men as they return home from the front-lines of Baghdad and struggle to reintegrate—both into their family lives and into American society at large.
Finkel is with these veterans in their most intimate, painful, and hopeful moments as they try to recover, and in doing so, he creates an indelible, essential portrait of what life after war is like—not just for these soldiers, but for their wives, widows, children, and friends, and for the professionals who are truly trying, and to a great degree failing, to undo the damage that has been done. Thank You for Your Service is an act of understanding, and it offers a more complete picture than we have ever had of two essential questions: When we ask young men and women to go to war, what are we asking of them? And when they return, what are we thanking them for?
"Finkel sketches a panoramic view of postwar life....A book that every American should read." —Jake Tapper, Los Angeles Times
Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and the New York Public Library Helen Bernstein Award for Excellence in Journalism. One of Ten Favorite Books of 2013 by Michiko Kakutani (The New York Times), a Washington Post Top Ten Book of the Year, and a New York Times Book Review Notable Book of the Year

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Awards

  • Release date

    October 1, 2013

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781427235343
      • File size: 226259 KB
      • Duration: 07:51:22

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Publisher's Weekly

      Starred review from July 15, 2013
      From April 2007 to April 2008, Finkel, a MacArthur Fellow and Pulitzer Prize–winning reporter with the Washington Post, spent a total of eight months embedded in eastern Iraq with the young infantrymen of the 2-16 as their battalion fought desperately to survive and to make Bush’s troop surge a success. In 2009’s The Good Soldiers (one of Publishers Weekly’s Best Books of the Year), he chronicled their harrowing day-to-day experiences—as their trust in the Iraqi people eroded, their nerves and comrades were shot, and IED after IED exploded. In this incredibly moving sequel, Finkel reconnects with some of the men of the 2-16—now home on American soil—and brings their struggles powerfully to life. These soldiers have names and daughters and bad habits and hopes, and though they have left the war in Iraq, the Iraq War has not left them. Now the battle consists of readjusting to civilian and family life, and bearing the often unbearable weight of their demons. Some have physical injuries, and all suffer from crippling PTSD. And as if navigating their own mental and emotional labyrinths weren’t enough of a challenge, they must also make sense of the Dickensian bureaucracy that is the Department of Veterans Affairs. Told in crisp, unsentimental prose and supplemented with excerpts from soldiers’ diaries, medical reports, e-mails, and text messages, their stories give new meaning to the costs of service—and to giving thanks. Photos. Agent: Melanie Jackson, Melanie Jackson Agency.

    • Library Journal

      Starred review from February 15, 2014

      After being embedded with the 2-16 Infantry Battalion during the intense surge campaign in Baghdad, Finkel produced The Good Soldiers. That critically acclaimed tale of the war in Iraq took readers into the soldiers' painful struggle to survive. Here, he follows up, staying close to the soldiers after their deployments end. In American homes and clinics, these veterans, their families, and their caregivers deal with the war's aftermath of PTSD, brain injuries, emotional shrapnel, and, in the midst of all this, spare moments of hope. Finkel's plain-spoken clarity is ably voiced by narrator Arthur Bishop. A story so moving, and so vital, has no need of pyrotechnics. VERDICT Highly recommended for all listeners.--Kelly Sinclair, Temple P.L., TX

      Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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