Plenty of Time When We Get Home: Love and Recovery in the Aftermath of War

Plenty of Time When We Get Home: Love and Recovery in the Aftermath of War PDF Author: Kayla Williams
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393242927
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
When SPC Kayla Williams and SGT Brian McGough met at a mountain outpost in Iraq in 2003, only their verbal sparring could have betrayed a hint of attraction. Neither could have predicted the sequence of events that would shape their lives. Brian, on his way back to base after mid-tour leave, was wounded by a roadside bomb that sent shrapnel through his brain. Kayla waited anxiously for news and, on returning home, sought out Brian. The two began a tentative romance and later married, but neither anticipated the consequences of Brian’s injury on their lives. Lacking essential support for returning veterans from the military and the VA, Kayla and Brian suffered through posttraumatic stress amplified by his violent mood swings, her struggles to reintegrate into a country still oblivious to women veterans, and what seemed the callous, consumerist indifference of civilian society at large. Kayla persevered. So did Brian. They fought for their marriage, drawing on remarkable reservoirs of courage and commitment. They confronted their demons head-on, impatient with phoniness of any sort. Inspired by an unwavering ethos of service, they continued to stand on common ground. Finally, they found their own paths to healing and wholeness, both as individuals and as a family, in dedication to a larger community.

Plenty of Time When We Get Home: Love and Recovery in the Aftermath of War

Plenty of Time When We Get Home: Love and Recovery in the Aftermath of War PDF Author: Kayla Williams
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393242927
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 272

Get Book Here

Book Description
When SPC Kayla Williams and SGT Brian McGough met at a mountain outpost in Iraq in 2003, only their verbal sparring could have betrayed a hint of attraction. Neither could have predicted the sequence of events that would shape their lives. Brian, on his way back to base after mid-tour leave, was wounded by a roadside bomb that sent shrapnel through his brain. Kayla waited anxiously for news and, on returning home, sought out Brian. The two began a tentative romance and later married, but neither anticipated the consequences of Brian’s injury on their lives. Lacking essential support for returning veterans from the military and the VA, Kayla and Brian suffered through posttraumatic stress amplified by his violent mood swings, her struggles to reintegrate into a country still oblivious to women veterans, and what seemed the callous, consumerist indifference of civilian society at large. Kayla persevered. So did Brian. They fought for their marriage, drawing on remarkable reservoirs of courage and commitment. They confronted their demons head-on, impatient with phoniness of any sort. Inspired by an unwavering ethos of service, they continued to stand on common ground. Finally, they found their own paths to healing and wholeness, both as individuals and as a family, in dedication to a larger community.

Plenty of Time When We Get Home: Love and Recovery in the Aftermath of War

Plenty of Time When We Get Home: Love and Recovery in the Aftermath of War PDF Author: Kayla Williams
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393239365
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
Documents the author's marriage to a fellow Iraq War veteran, describing the impact of his brain injury on their relationship, their shared efforts to overcome post-traumatic stress, and the lack of support for veterans.

Love My Rifle More than You: Young and Female in the U.S. Army

Love My Rifle More than You: Young and Female in the U.S. Army PDF Author: Kayla Williams
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393076199
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 298

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Book Description
“Brave, honest, and necessary.”—Nancy Pearl, NPR Seattle Kayla Williams is one of the 15 percent of the U.S. Army that is female, and she is a great storyteller. With a voice that is “funny, frank and full of gritty details” (New York Daily News), she tells of enlisting under Clinton; of learning Arabic; of the sense of duty that fractured her relationships; of being surrounded by bravery and bigotry, sexism and fear; of seeing 9/11 on Al-Jazeera; and of knowing she would be going to war. With a passion that makes her memoir “nearly impossible to put down” (Buffalo News) Williams shares the powerful gamut of her experiences in Iraq, from caring for a wounded civilian to aiming a rifle at a child. Angry at the bureaucracy and the conflicting messages of today’s military, Williams offers us “a raw, unadulterated look at war” (San Antonio Express News) and at the U.S. Army. And she gives us a woman’s story of empowerment and self-discovery.

The War Comes with You

The War Comes with You PDF Author: Stacey Peebles
Publisher: Univ of South Carolina Press
ISBN: 1643365169
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 195

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Book Description
How do we tell twenty-first-century war stories when the wars seem to go on forever? In the post-2011 surge of war stories published in America and Iraq, the defining characteristic is the depiction of combat violence that crosses borders, overtakes civilian spaces, and disrupts chronology. In The War Comes with You: Enduring War in Life, Fiction, and Fantasy, Stacey Peebles picks up where her groundbreaking first book, Welcome to the Suck: Narrating the American Soldier's Experience in Iraq, left off. Via careful readings of fiction, memoir, and poetry by writers such as Ben Fountain, Siobhan Fallon, Brian Turner, and Hassan Blasim, as well as recent superhero and Star Wars films, Peebles argues that, in the face of real and fantasy "forever wars," things fall apart. Language, identities, bodies, and even the stories themselves fragment. These narratives suggest that people need not accept incoherence and there is a range of meaningful responses to the experience of everywhere, all-the-time war. Peebles illustrates what to do, that is, when war comes with you.

The Hell of War Comes Home

The Hell of War Comes Home PDF Author: Owen W. Gilman Jr.
Publisher: Univ. Press of Mississippi
ISBN: 1496815793
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 265

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Book Description
Owen W. Gilman Jr. stresses the US experience of war in the twenty-first century and argues that wherever and whenever there is war, there will be imaginative responses to it, especially the recent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Since the trauma of September 11, the experience of Americans at war has been rendered honestly and fully in a wide range of texts--creative nonfiction and journalism, film, poetry, and fiction. These responses, Gilman contends, have packed a lot of power and measure up even to World War II's literature and film. Like few other books, Gilman's volume studies these new texts-- among them Kevin Powers's debut novel The Yellow Birds and Phil Klay's short stories Redeployment, along with the films The Hurt Locker, American Sniper, and Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk. For perspective, Gilman also looks at some touchstones from the Vietnam War. Compared to a few of the big Vietnam books and films, this new material has mostly been read and watched by small audiences and generated less discussion. Gilman exposes the circumstances in American culture currently preventing literature and film of our recent wars from making a significant impact. He contends that Americans' inclination to demand distraction limits learning from these compelling responses to war in the past decade. According to Gilman, where there should be clarity and depth of knowledge, we instead face misunderstanding and the anguish endured by veterans betrayed by war and our lack of understanding.

Today We Go Home

Today We Go Home PDF Author: Kelli Estes
Publisher: Sourcebooks, Inc.
ISBN: 1492664197
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 347

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Book Description
"Today We Go Home shines an illuminating light on history and the female soldiers who have served this country from the Civil War to Afghanistan today. Kelli Estes passionately brings the past to life, interweaving the story of two women from different centuries whose journey towards hope is timeless."—GWENDOLYN WOMACK, USA Today bestselling author of The Fortune Teller and The Time Collector In this evocative work of historical fiction, USA Today bestselling author Kelli Estes pairs two military women who—in the Civil War and Afghanistan—share determination, honor, and a call to serve the United States, no matter the cost. Seattle, Washington: Larkin Bennett has always known her place, whether it's surrounded by her loving family in the lush greenery of the Pacific Northwest or conducting a dusty patrol in Afghanistan. But all of that changed the day tragedy struck her unit and took away everything she held dear. Soon after the disaster, Larkin discovers an unexpected treasure—the diary of Emily Wilson, a young woman who disguised herself as a man to fight for the Union in the Civil War. As Larkin struggles to heal, she finds herself drawn deeply into Emily's life and the secrets she kept. Indiana, 1861: The only thing more dangerous to Emily Wilson than a rebel soldier is the risk of her own comrades in the Union Army discovering her secret. But, as the war marches on and takes its terrible toll, Emily begins to question everything she thought she was willing to risk her life for. Historical fiction fans of Marie Benedict, Beatriz Williams, and Kate Quinn will be inspired by this story of two women in militaries, separated by centuries, but united in hope and dignity.

Our Veterans

Our Veterans PDF Author: Suzanne Gordon
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 1478023147
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 209

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Book Description
In Our Veterans, Suzanne Gordon, Steve Early, and Jasper Craven explore the physical, emotional, social, economic, and psychological impact of military service and the problems that veterans face when they return to civilian life. The authors critically examine the role of advocacy organizations, philanthropies, corporations, and politicians who purport to be “pro-veteran.” They describe the ongoing debate about the cost, quality, and effectiveness of healthcare provided or outsourced by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). They also examine generational divisions and political tensions among veterans, as revealed in the tumultuous events of 2020, from Black Lives Matter protests to the Trump-Biden presidential contest. Frank and revealing, Our Veterans proposes a new agenda for veterans affairs linking service provision to veterans to the quest for broader social programs benefiting all Americans.

Gender for the Warfare State

Gender for the Warfare State PDF Author: Robin Truth Goodman
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317199294
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 322

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Book Description
Gender for the Warfare State is the first scholarly investigation into the written works of U.S. women combat veterans in twenty-first century wars. Most recent studies quantify military participation, showing how many women participate in armed services and what their experiences are in a traditionally “male institution.” Many of these treatments regard women as victims solely of enemy fire, even as they are also often victims of their own military apparatus and of their own involvement in global aggression. By applying literary analysis to a sociological question, Gender for the Warfare State views women’s experiences through story and literary traditions that carry meaning into present practices. Goodman shows that women in combat are not just entering and being victimized in “male institutions,” but are also actively changing the story of gender and thus the structure of power that is constructed through gender. Moreover, this book unveils a new narrative of care that affects economic relations more broadly and the contemporary politics of the liberal social contract. Women’s participation in combat is not just a U.S. event but global and therefore has a deeper historical range than current sociological accounts imply. The book compares the political contexts of women’s entry into war now with their prior, twentieth-century contributions to wars in other cultural settings and then uses this comparison to show a variety of meanings at play in the gender of war.

Fidelis

Fidelis PDF Author: Teresa Fazio
Publisher: U of Nebraska Press
ISBN: 1640125442
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 232

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Book Description
A woman Marine officer’s story of coming of age.

Shakespeare’s Military Spouses and Twenty-First-Century Warfare

Shakespeare’s Military Spouses and Twenty-First-Century Warfare PDF Author: Kelsey Ridge
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000425363
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 287

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Book Description
This volume presents a fresh look at the military spouses in Shakespeare’s Othello, 1 Henry IV, Julius Caesar, Troilus and Cressida, Macbeth, and Coriolanus, vital to understanding the plays themselves. By analysing the characters as military spouses, we can better understand current dynamics in modern American civilian and military culture as modern American military spouses live through the War on Terror. Shakespeare's Military Spouses and Twenty-First-Century Warfare explains what these plays have to say about the role of military families and cultural constructions of masculinity both in the texts themselves and in modern America. Concerns relevant to today’s military families – domestic violence, PTSD, infertility, the treatment of queer servicemembers, war crimes, and the growing civil-military divide – pervade Shakespeare’s works. These parallels to the contemporary lived experience are brought out through reference to memoirs written by modern-day military spouses, sociological studies of the American armed forces, and reports issued by the Department of Defence. Shakespeare’s military spouses create a discourse that recognizes the role of the military in national defence but criticizes risky or damaging behaviours and norms, promoting the idea of a martial identity that permits military defence without the dangers of toxic masculinity. Meeting at the intersection of Shakespeare Studies, trauma studies, and military studies, this focus on military spouses is a unique and unprecedented resource for academics in these fields, as well as for groups interested in Shakespeare and theatre as a way of thinking through and responding to psychiatric issues and traumatic experiences.