Another Man's War by Sam Childers

Another Man's War: The True Story of One Man's Battle to Save Children in the Sudan by Sam Childers Hardback: 223 pages Publisher: Thomas Nelson First Released: 2009 Author Website Orphanage Website Buy from Amazon

Source: review copy from publisher

Back Cover Description:
The rise of Sam Childers from violent, drug-addicted biker to a man willing to risk everything to rescue the orphans and child soldiers of Sudan

"All my life, from birth, it's been a fight. And it always seemed to be another man's war. I always seemed to be fighting for someone else. But it always came back to me. The Word says we're born into sin, and sin always comes back to war." -Sam Childers

Sam Childers has always been a fighter. Born to a violent father and a mother of great faith, his life was a contradiction. With an affinity for drugs and women, the angry young man grew into a drug-dealing biker. But that was then. Nowadays Sam--along with the cadre of Sudanese soldiers he employs--spends his time in the most dangerous parts of Sudan and Uganda rescuing the youngest victims of war, orphans and child-soldiers. His mission is simple: save the children, no matter the cost.


Review:
This memoir tells the story of Sam Childers and of the children of southern Sudan and northern Uganda. About half of the book describes Sam Childers' youth, including his years as a drug-using and -selling biker and how he left that life to become a Christian preacher called by God to minister in Africa.

The rest of the book describes his ministry in Sudan and Uganda: first driving a mobile medical clinic to areas without access to medical services and now building and protecting a compound where children left orphans by the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) can grow up in safty. He describes what life is like in the areas the LRA (a rebel group led by Joseph Kony) terrorizes villagers, why children are kidnapped by the LRA, what happens to them when they are, and how they get free.

He briefly describes the recent history of Sudan and Uganda. He also describes God's protection and provision of his work there. He describes rescues, going into danger areas, and the fighting. He describes in detail the Village/orphanage and what they provide for the children who live there.

The book is interesting, well-written, and fast-paced. I would have liked to know more about how they help the children recover from what they've seen and experienced, though. For those who don't like gore and suffering, this book has few gory details. Personal accounts of what the children and villages suffer at the hands of the LRA are given briefly and with few details.

Sam Childers is outspoken about his Christian faith in the book and gives credit for a number of miracles (mainly of protection and provision) to God, but he says that a lot of non-Christians are interested in and supportive of his work. So this book might be interesting to non-Christians despite the Christian content. If you're someone who believes there's never any justification for using violence, then I doubt you'll like this book.

I'd recommend this book, especially to those who like incredible-but-true missionary stories, to soldiers who are Christians, and to those interested in what's being done to help the children in southern Sudan and northern Uganda.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.


Excerpt: Chapter One
Death hides in the tall grass of Southern Sudan. What looks like empty landscape can explode in a heartbeat with rebels from the Lord's Resistance Army shooting, slashing, and burning their way through an unsuspecting village. Government officials and NGOs (nongovernmental organizations, like CARE, the United Nations, and the Red Cross) give these renegade soldiers a wide berth; they usually know where the trouble areas are and steer clear of them. Local residents, left to make it on their own, are constantly on edge, always afraid. There are no peaceful nights in the bush. None, that is, except in one place--a forty-acre island of safety and calm in the middle of a hellish, endless civil war. The Shekinah Fellowship Children's Village.

The struggle to keep it secure never stops.

Gunfire crackles here and there outside the perimeter fence day and night. Whenever I travel in the area, I expect to get ambushed. I've had my windshield and my side window shot out. I've had vehicles, including a food truck loaded with groceries for the orphanage, blown up by RPGs. The LRA will shoot at anything, but they're not used to anybody shooting back. They don't expect to be up against a truckload of soldiers with plenty of guns and ammo, which is what they get when they tangle with us on the road.

When I first started driving around in Southern Sudan, my soldiers and I got ambushed all the time. To any normal person that would be a bad thing, but I thought it was great.

The Road to Unafraid by Captain Jeff Struecker

The Road to Unafraid by Captain Jeff Struecker with Dean Merrill Hardback: 207 pages Publisher: W Publishing Group First Released: 2006 Author Website Buy from Amazon

Source: Bought from Half.com

Back Cover Description:
In 1993, Jeff Struecker landed in Somalia as part of an elite military force sent to curtail a warlord's ruthless abuse of the population. What erupted in the end was an eighteen-hour suicide mission through the bullet-riddled streets of Mogadishu to rescue a band of downed soldiers.

Recounting in vivid, blood-pulsing detail, Struecker shares the story of coming face to face with mankind's greatest fears, both in Somalia and other global hotspots like Panama, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Struecker's sometimes shocking story assures us that "the difference between being a coward and a hero is not whether you're scared, it's what you do while you're scared."

This is the road to unafraid.


Review:
The Road to Unafraid is definitely a quick and suspenseful read. The author briefly tells us about his childhood and training to become a Ranger (and, later, a chaplain). He spends most of the book describing his combat experiences and the military-related challenges he's faced.

Jeff Struecker is very open about the fears, frustrations, and challenges he dealt with while in combat and what he learned from them. He also gives insight into military culture and a soldier's view of the various military conflicts the U.S.A. has been involved in since he enlisted in the army.

While he descibes scenes from his various deployments, much of the book is a detailed view of the part he played in the Somalia "Black Hawk Down" incident. His vivid descriptions made me feel like I was with him in the scene, surrounded by danger. It certainly did get my heart racing. His descriptions of the Best Ranger competition were also excellent--I got tired just reading about all they went through.

The author also described how his Christian faith helped him deal with the stresses of military life and the fears involved in combat. Overall, this book well-written, suspenseful, and insightful. I'd recommend it to anyone who has never been in the military but who wants insight into what soldiers may face when in training and combat.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.


Excerpt: Introduction
Fearless?

U.S. Army Rangers don't get scared. We've made a name for ourselves as the fearless ones. We're a tough, disciplined, quick-strike force that parachutes or helicopters into nasty situations, kicks down doors, captures the bad guys, and forces openings for the rest of the army to follow--hence our motto, "Rangers Lead the Way."

Give us the hardest, most dangerous, most challenging mission you can think of. We'll take it on. We're the elite--fewer than half a percent of all active-duty soldiers. We go where others are not able or not trained to go. We instinctively run toward the fight, not away from it.

At least that's the mystique. Line up any one hundred guys who have served successfully in the Ranger Regiment and ask if they've ever been afraid. You'll get no takers.

We stand in the long, proud line of those Rangers who first pushed onto Omaha Beach on D-Day back in 1944. It was Rangers who scaled straight up the ninety-foot cliffs of Pointe-du-Hoc that day to knock out a nest of 155-millimeter German cannons that were holding off the Allied invasion.

It was Rangers who jumped onto the airfields of Grenada (1983), taking on the enemy with no backup for hours. We Rangers did the same in Panama (1989). We were the ones who came oh-so-close to breaking the back of Somali warlord Mohamed Farrah Aidid and restoring sanity to that desperate country (1993)--until our government pulled us out. If you've read Mark Bowden's excellent bestseller Black Hawk Down or seen the Academy Award-winning movie, you know all about that. In this book, I'll give you my take on what happened there.

Along the way I may surprise you by admitting that I've been afraid more than once or twice during my thirteen-plus years in the Ranger Regiment. That may upset some people. But it's true.

I've felt the same fears as those who've never worn the uniform. Fear of death. Fear of losing your most valued relationships. Fear of running out of money. Fear of getting sick. Fear of violence. Fear of embarrassment. These happen all across the human spectrum.

How we handle our fears makes a huge difference. We can let them paralyze us, or we can find the courage to rise above them. Through my experiences, I share some extreme examples of facing threats and overcoming the panic they generate inside. My hope is to encourage you in your private battles.


Here's a link to read further.

As We Forgive by Catherine Claire Larson

As We Forgive by Catherine Claire Larson Trade Paperback: 284 pages Publisher: Zondervan First Released: 2009 Author Website Buy from Amazon

Source: review copy from publisher

Back Cover Description:
If you were told that a murderer was to be released into your neighborhood, how would you feel? But what if it weren't only one, but thousands?

Could there be a common roadmap to reconciliation? Could there be a shared future after unthinkable evil? If forgiveness is possible after the slaughter of nearly a million in a hundred days in Rwanda, then today, more than ever, we owe it to humanity to explore how one country is addressing perceptual, social-psychological, and spiritual dimensions to achieve a more lasting peace. If forgiveness is possible after genocide, then perhaps there is hope for the comparably smaller rifts that plague our relationships, our communities, and our nation.

Based on personal interviews and thorough research, As We Forgive returns to the boundary lines of genocide's wounds and traces the route of reconciliation in the lives of Rwandans--victims, widows, orphans, and perpetrators--whose past and future intersect. We find in these stories how suffering, memory, and identity set up roadblocks to forgiveness, while mediation, truth-telling, restitution, and interdependence creates bridges to healing.

As We Forgive explores the pain, the mystery, and the hope through seven compelling stories of those who have made this journey toward reconciliation. The result is a narrative that breathes with humanity and is as haunting as it is hopeful.


Review:
This book tells seven personal stories of experiences during the genocide, its aftermath, and how they came to forgiveness. These accounts are intense, vivid, and powerful. The people in these stories came from different areas and had different experiences, giving the reader a good idea of what happened during the genocide and afterward. The book is worth reading for these stories alone.

The narratives effectively show the struggle of how to forgive and gain peace. However, after each story, the author also comments on various methods of forgiveness and reconciliation and on restorative justice. To me, those comments felt distant and clinical in contrast to the intensely intimate view of pain and forgiveness given in the narrative. Except for one chart/argument given by the author in the first section (which I felt tried to make a complex subject too simplistic and neat), the information she gives is useful and relevant. This information is geared toward anyone, no matter their religion (or lack of one).

Though the author doesn't focus on Christian principles of forgiveness, the Rwandans described in these accounts are Christians or become Christians and this is what allows them to forgive.

The violence described during the genocide is not explicit or gory in detail, though it is still heart-rending at times. I'd recommend this powerful book to anyone struggling with forgiveness or who wants to know more about the Rwandan genocide and what's happening there now.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.


Excerpt: Chapter One
Cadeaux's eyes laughed. A grin flickered across her face and settled into a slight smile as she went to fetch water. Leaning over the bucket, Cadeaux splashed water on her cheeks, not noticing the dark beauty shimmering back at her. With a block of soap, she scrubbed her neck, her arms, her legs, her feet, and finally her sandals while her slender shadow bowed beneath Rwanda's fierce August sun. At the age of twelve, she was on the cusp of womanhood, but still had the frame of a child and a sheen of innocence.

Her sandaled feet skimmed along the path as she returned home. Were it not for the vividness of the yellow jacaranda trees, the seamless blue skies, and Cadeaux's swishing lavender skirt, the road, the homes, and the roofs would have seemed a still life in sepia.

Back home, Cadeaux broke a deep silence with her soft footfalls and the creak of a door latch. Inside, her mother, Rosaria, had been going about her daily chores cloaked with an air of solemn dignity, wearing her sorrow like holy garments. A crushed hand hung like prayer breads loosely at her side.

Rosaria's eyes lit on Cadeaux as she flitted past. Somehow, the saturated air felt less stifling with her there. Rosaria breathed more freely. More than bread or wine or water, Cadeaux seemed to her mother a sacrament--a visible sign of inward grace. The name Rosaria gave her had this ripeness of meaning. Born in December of 1994, nine months and four days after horror's opening night, Cadeaux is her mother's consolation, her laughter, and her hope. Her name means "gift," because, as Rosaria will tell you, "She was the only gift I had left."

Sitting at the Feet of Rabbi Jesus by Ann Spangler, Lois Tverberg

Sitting at the Feet of Rabbi Jesus by Ann Spangler, Lois Tverberg Hardback: 254 pages Publisher: Zondervan First Released: 2009 Ann Spangler's Website Lois Tverberg's Website Buy from Amazon

Source: review copy from publisher

Back Cover Description:
A rare chance to know Jesus as his first disciples knew him.

What would it be like to journey back to the first century and sit at the feet of Rabbi Jesus as one of his Jewish disciples? How would your understanding of the gospel have been shaped by the customs, beliefs, and traditions of the Jewish culture in which you lived?

Sitting at the Feet of Rabbi Jesus takes you on a fascinating tour of the Jewish world of Jesus, offering inspirational insights that can transform your faith. Ann Spangler and Lois Tverberg paint powerful scenes from Jesus’ ministry, immersing you in the prayers, feasts, history, culture, and customs that shaped Jesus and those who followed him.

You will hear the parables as they must have sounded to first-century Jews, powerful and surprising. You will join the conversations that were already going on among the rabbis of his day. You will watch with new understanding as the events of his life unfold. And you will emerge with new excitement about the roots of your own Christian faith.

Sitting at the Feet of Rabbi Jesus will change the way you read Scripture and deepen your understanding of the life of Jesus. It will also help you to adapt the rich prayers and customs you learn about to your own life, in ways that both respect and enrich your Christian faith.

By looking at the Jewishness of Jesus, Ann Spangler and Lois Tverberg take you on a captivating journey into the heart of Judaism, one that is both balanced and insightful, helping you to better understand and appreciate your own faith.


Review:
Do you sometimes feel like you don't quite understand the parables on the Kingdom of Heaven? Or like you're missing the full meaning of the Sermon on the Mount? Have you ever wondered how the disciples would have understood Jesus' actions during the Last Supper?

I've read the Gospels numerous times and read many books about what life was like in Biblical times. Frankly, I didn't realize until now how much I was missing by not understanding the rabbinic teaching styles of the time (among other things). Despite all my study, most of this information was new.

This book opened up my understanding of the Gospels by allowing me to see the deeper, richer meaning that would have been understood all along by the Jewish audiences of Jesus' day.

The book consists of general cultural notes alternated with using that new knowledge to examine specific Gospel passages. However, this book isn't just an intellectual exercise--it'll have you digging into your Bible with new enthusiasm and will deepen your walk with God.

While Christians who have a solid foundational knowledge of the Gospels will probably get the most out of this book, I'd highly recommend it to any Christian who wants a deeper understanding of Christ and his teachings.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.

If you're interested in reading this book, check out my ChristFocus Book Club for a chance at winning a free copy.


Excerpt from Chapter One
[starting on page 15] You are probably familiar with a dramatic gesture Mary made one day, sitting at the feet of Jesus once again. John 12:3 describes the scene like this: "Then Mary took about a pint of pure nard, an expensive perfume; she poured it on Jesus' feet and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume."

Without understanding the cultural background in which this event occurred, it's easy to miss the full significance of Mary's gesture. What exactly was she trying to communicate? Jesus himself clarified one aspect of the story by commenting that Mary was preparing him for the day of his burial (Matt. 26:12). We understand that her act of devotion pointed toward Christ's death at the end of the week. But we miss something else that the disciples would have immediately realized, something so obvious that Jesus didn't even need to mention it. By anointing him with expensive fragrances, Mary may well have been making a statement about who she believed Jesus was, proclaiming him as Messiah. In fact, the Hebrew word for Messiah is Mashiach, which literally means "the Anointed One." Christos, or "Christ," is the Greek equivalent.

But why "the Anointed One?" The word "Messiah" alludes to the ceremony used to set apart someone chosen by God, like a king or a priest. Instead of being crowned during a coronation, Hebrew kings were anointed with sacred oil perfumed with extremely expensive spices. Only used for consecrating objects in the temple and for anointing priests and kings, the sacred anointing oil would have been more valuable than diamonds. The marvelous scent that it left behind acted like an invisible "crown," conferring an aura of holiness on its recipients. Everything and everyone with that unique fragrance was recognized as belonging to God in a special way.

[There's even more on the anointing, but I need to end this excerpt here!]

A Comrade Lost and Found by Jan Wong

A Comrade Lost and Found: A Beijing Story by Jan Wong Hardback: 322 pages Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt First Released: 2009 Buy from Amazon

Source: review copy from publisher

Back Cover Description:
A journalist’s search through Beijing for the classmate she betrayed during the Cultural Revolution reveals three decades of Chinese transformation.

In the early 1970s, at the height of the Cultural Revolution, Jan Wong traveled from Canada to become one of only two Westerners permitted to study at Beijing University. One day a fellow student, Yin Luoyi, asked for help getting to the United States. Wong, then a starry-eyed Maoist, immediately reported her to the authorities, and shortly thereafter Yin disappeared.

Thirty-three years later, hoping to make amends, Wong revisits the Chinese capital, with her husband and teenage sons in tow, to search for the person who has haunted her conscience. At the very least, she wants to discover whether Yin survived. But Wong finds the city bewildering—ancient landmarks have made way for luxury condominiums. In the new Beijing, phone numbers, addresses, and even names change with startling frequency. In a society determined to bury the past, Yin Luoyi will be hard to find.

As she traces her way from one former comrade to the next, Wong unearths not only the fate of the woman she betrayed but a web of fates that mirrors the strange and dramatic journey of contemporary China and rekindles all of her love for—and disillusionment with—her ancestral land.


Review:
This book is a memoir covering the author's experiences in China when she was college-aged up until just before the Beijing Olympics. The frame story is about her month-long trip to Beijing to find and apologize to a woman she betrayed when she was much younger. As the author tells about her present-day trip, she segues into relevant information about what China is like now and what it used to be like.

It's China like you probably never imagined it. The descriptions of city life are vivid and made me feel as if I was experiencing the trip with her. From the party held in her honor by her old teachers to roaming the streets and looking into bars and massage parlors, the trip is a fascinating one.

The author has the ability to laugh at herself and all but the most serious parts are told with a touch of loving humor.

Overall, the book was well-written and very interesting. I'd highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in what China (or, at least, Beijing) is like now and how it's changed in the last forty years.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.


Excerpt: Chapter One
Mission Impossible

On the tarmac at Newark International Airport, a heat wave makes the August air dance. Inside our Boeing 777, a black flight attendant sings out the standard Chinese greeting. "Ni hao," she chimes, mangling the tones. Nevertheless the passengers, mostly mainland Chinese, seem pleased. When even this American female is trying to speak their language, it reinforces their view that the Middle Kingdom is, once again, the center of the world.

My husband, Norman, and I lived in Beijing for years during the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. On this trip back, we are bringing two reluctant fellow travelers, our teenaged sons, Ben, sixteen, and Sam, thirteen. As usual these days on flights to Beijing, every seat is taken. The Chinese passengers in their knock-off Burberry outfits are more self-assured than the handful who left the mainland during Chairman Mao’s Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. In the 1970s, the Chinese who traveled abroad were members of official delegations, kept on short leashes, tight schedules and tiny cash allowances.

Foreigners heading to China faced obstacles, too. Beijing rarely issued visas to Americans, but Norman was deemed to be "friendly." His father, Jack Shulman, had been an aide to William Z. Foster, longtime head of the Communist Party USA. In 1965, Jack had gone to Beijing to polish English-language propaganda at Xinhua, the state-run New China News Agency. To the Chinese, it was natural for a son to join his father. Filial piety, however, wasn’t Norman’s motivating factor. The Vietnam War was. At twenty-two, he was looking for an interesting place to dodge the draft.

In 1966, his journey from New York City to Beijing would take days. The United States had no diplomatic relations with China. To obtain a visa, Norman had to fly to London. From there, the only air route to mainland China was a twice-monthly Pakistan International Airlines flight to Canton, now known as Guangzhou. PIA normally refueled twice en route, in Karachi and Dhaka. At the time, India was at war with Pakistan, so Norman’s flight was rerouted through Colombo, Sri Lanka. When his flight finally landed in Canton, he was a jet-lagged wreck. But the arrival of a foreigner was a rare chance to feast at government expense. Hungry local officials insisted on feeding him a ten-course banquet, after which they bundled him aboard a three-hour flight to Beijing.

Forty years later, Continental Airlines flight 89 takes thirteen hours. With the Cold War over, it zips across the Arctic Circle and the former Soviet Union. Our tickets are a bargain, too, 80 percent less expensive in real terms than when I first went to China in 1972. The Middle Kingdom is still on the other side of the world, but it’s no longer far away.

***

Ben and Sam spent their earliest years in Beijing. They were born during my six-year posting as China correspondent for the Toronto Globe and Mail. Sam was one when we moved back to Canada in 1994. He remembers nothing. Ben, who was four, has fragmented memories. He recalls making little cakes from Play-Doh with Nanny Ma. He remembers wandering into the kitchen to sit on Cook Mu’s lap.

In 2003, the year severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, broke out in Beijing (and Toronto), Norman and I figured the Great Wall might not be too crowded. After the all-clear, we took the boys back for the grand tour. Along with the Wall, we visited the Forbidden City, the Temple of Heaven, the terra cotta warriors in Xi’an, the Shanghai Bund and the Yangtze River. We picked grapes in Kashgar and sledded down sand dunes in the Gobi Desert.

Now, when I propose a holiday in Beijing, my sons both groan. Ben would rather hang out in Toronto with his girlfriend, Tash, and go mountain biking with friends. Sam prefers to play road hockey and chat on MSN. The boys grow markedly unenthusiastic when I mention I also plan to hire a Chinese tutor in Beijing so they can start each day with private Mandarin lessons.

"Um, do I have to go?" Sam asks politely, hoping good manners will get him off the hook.

"Yes," I say.

"Why do I have to go?" Ben asks belligerently, hoping attitude will get him off the hook.

"Because," I reply enigmatically, "I need you."

I Dared to Call Him Father by Bilquis Sheikh with Richard H. Schneider

No Cover Available

I Dared to Call Him Father by Bilquis Sheikh with Richard H. Schneider Trade Paperback: 173 pages Publisher: Baker Book House First Released: 1978 Buy from Amazon

Source: Bought from Half.com

Book Description:
This book is the story of a high-born middle-aged Pakistani Muslim woman who converted from Islam to Christianity in 1966. The story describes how she came to convert to Christianity and the consequences to herself and her extended Muslim family over the next six years.


Review:
This book is the story of a high-born middle-aged Pakistani Muslim woman who converted from Islam to Christianity in 1966. The story describes how she came to convert to Christianity and the consequences to herself and her extended Muslim family over the next six years.

The book provided a fascinating look into what life was like for Christians in Pakistan in 1966 to 1972. Pakistan is an Islam nation, but apparently the culture was fairly moderate until a change occurred in the government in 1976. Still, at the time Bilquis Sheikh converted, Christianity was for the poor who wanted food and clothing from the missionaries, not for the rich.

The book started with a series of startling supernatural things that happened to her that led her to start deeply studying the Koran and, later, the Bible. Then she took her grandson to a hospital, and a nun suggested she pray to God as her father. The idea was a shocking one, but she tried it...and got a response. After sneaking over to ask questions of two Christian missionaries and carefully considering how converting would affect her life, she becomes a Christian. When the news becomes public, her life was threatened and her own family shunned her. During this time, she also struggled with how to constantly stay in the presence of God and the book shows some of the conclusions she came to.

Overall, the book was a well-written, engrossing, and powerful story. The author was very open about her faults and struggles, both before and after her conversion. I'd very highly recommend it to all Christians.

If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.


Excerpt: Chapter One
The strange prickly feeling grew inside me as I walked slowly along the graveled paths of my garden. It was deep twilight. The scent of late narcissus hung heavy in the air. What was it, I wondered, that made me so uneasy?

I stopped my walk and looked around. Inside my home some distance across the broad lawn the servants were beginning to flick on lights in the dining area. Outside all seemed peaceful and quiet. I reached out to snip off some of the pungent white blossoms for my bedroom. As I leaned over to grasp the tall green stems, something brushed past my head.

I straightened in alarm. What was it? A mist-like cloud--a cold, damp unholy presence--had floated by. The garden suddenly seemed darker. A chilling breeze sprang up through the weeping willows and I shivered.

Get hold of yourself, Bilquis! I scolded. My imagination was playing tricks on me. Nevertheless, I gathered my flowers and headed quickly toward the house where windows glowed in warm reassurance. Its sturdy white stone walls and oaken doors offered protection. As I hurried along the crunchy gravel path I found myself glancing over my shoulder. I had always laughed at talk of the supernatural. Of course there wasn't anything out there. Was there?

As if in answer, I felt a firm, very real and uncanny tap on my right hand.

I screamed. I rushed into the house and slammed the door behind me. My servants ran to me, afraid to make any comment at all, for I must have looked like a ghost myself.

Odysseus in America by Jonathan Shay, M.D., Ph.D.

Odysseus in America: Combat Trauma and the Trials of Homecoming by Jonathan Shay, M.D., Ph.D. Hardback: 329 pages Publisher: Scribner First Released: 2002 Buy from Amazon

Source: Bought from Half.com

Back Cover Description:
In his acclaimed book Achilles in Vietnam, Dr. Jonathan Shay used the Iliad as a prism through which to examine how ancient and modern wars have battered the psychology of the men who fight. Now he turns his attention to the Odyssey, Homer's classic story of a soldier's homecoming, to illuminate the real problems faced by combat veterans reentering civilian society. Drawing on his years of experience working with Vietnam veterans, Shay illustrates how the Odyssey can be read as a metaphor for the pitfalls that trap many veterans on the road back to civilian life. He also explains how veterans recover, and advocates changes to American military practice that will protect future servicemen and servicewomen while increasing their fighting power.

The Odyssey, Shay argues, offers explicit portrayals of behavior common among returning soldiers in our own culture -- danger-seeking, womanizing, explosive violence, drug abuse, visitation by the dead, obsession, vagrancy, and homelessness. Supporting his reading with examples from his fifteen-year practice treating Vietnam combat veterans, Shay shows how Odysseus's mistrustfulness, his lies, and his constant need to conceal his thoughts and emotions foreshadow the experiences of many of today's veterans. Throughout, Homer strengthens our understanding of what a combat veteran must overcome to return to and flourish in civilian life, just as the heartbreaking stories of the veterans Shay treats give us a new understanding of one of the world's greatest classics.

With a foreword by Vietnam veteran U.S. Senators John McCain and Max Cleland, representing bipartisan support for what Dr. Shay is trying to accomplish, Odysseus in America is an impassioned and cogent plea to renovate American military institutions -- and a brilliant rereading of Homer's epic.


Review:
This book discusses how soldiers, both in ancient Greece and in Vietnam, coped with what they'd seen and done during the war once they came home. Ingrained behaviors that once kept them alive now had no place, and civilians (even family) often denied them the emotional safety needed to express their pain and trauma so that they could come to a place of healing.

The first part of the book breaks down the various adventures in Odysseus and shows how each demonstrates an experience or coping behavior of military personal who have returned from war. (A summary version of the epic poem is provided in the appendix for those who haven't read it lately.) The author then gives examples of similar problems and coping behaviors that he's seen in his work with Vietnam veterans with severe PTSD.

The second part of the book briefly discusses several methods the author has successfully used to help restore veterans with severe PTSD to healthy, useful lives.

The last part of the book shows how the current military practices (in organization and incentives) could be changed to help prevent PTSD while also making our forces more effective as fighting units. Frankly, I was appalled to discover that some effective, life-saving military organizational practices were discarded for very petty reasons. I hope things have changed in this regard since 2002.

The author has a very different worldview than I do. He believes that war and subsequent coping behavior come from how we evolved. He also seems to believe that all religions are equally able to help veterans cope with their feelings of guilt. Because of our different worldviews, I was not entirely convinced by several of his conclusions throughout the book.

Overall, this book was interesting and easy to read. The veteran's story's were often heart-rending. This book was a valuable source of information about the struggles of Vietnam veterans, some ways these struggles can be won, and some ways PTSD can be prevented in future generations of military personal. I'd recommend this book to anyone who has served in the military during a war (though there may be better books out there for those who are actually struggling with severe PTSD) or to anyone who wants a better understanding of what Vietnam veterans went through upon their return from war.

If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.

Excerpt: Chapter One
Homer's Odyssey is the epic homecoming of a Greek fighter from the Trojan War. Odysseus' trick of the hollow horse got the Greeks inside the walls of Troy, a feat that ten-to-one superiority in troop strength had never achieved. He was the very last fighter to make it home from Troy and endured the most grueling travel, costing him a full decade on the way. Odysseus' return ended in a bloody, triumphant shoot-'em-up. It is now more than thirty years since the majority of American veterans of the Vietnam War have returned home--physically. Psychologically and socially, however, "many of us aren't home yet," in the words of one combat medic.

My portrait of the psychologically injured combat veteran is colored by respect and love. However, I shall conceal none of the ugly and hateful ways that war veterans have sometimes acted toward others and themselves during their attempts to come home and be at home. To the ancient Greeks, Odysseus' name meant "man of hate" or "he who sows trouble." Indeed, some veterans have sown trouble in their families. No one should ever hear from his mother, "You're not my son!" or "Better you died over there than come home like this." Yet veterans with severe psychological injuries have sometimes heard these terrible words.