sewfrench's review against another edition
5.0
This book helps explain exactly what you are saying when you say thank you for your service. Very difficult, at times, to read, but not as difficult as living is for some of these soldiers.
It is a peek inside the lives of soldiers living with PTSD and or TBI (traumatic brain injury) or be the support person of one living life "after war".
David Finkel is a reporter for The Washington Post and the author of “The Good Soldiers,” which was an account of the Iraq surge. Finkel embedded himself with the men of the Army’s Second Battalion, 16th Infantry Regiment during its 15-month deployment in Iraq in 2007-08. In Thank You for Your Service, Finkel looks at after the war — at what happens when our soldiers (the Army’s Second Battalion) return home.
It is a peek inside the lives of soldiers living with PTSD and or TBI (traumatic brain injury) or be the support person of one living life "after war".
David Finkel is a reporter for The Washington Post and the author of “The Good Soldiers,” which was an account of the Iraq surge. Finkel embedded himself with the men of the Army’s Second Battalion, 16th Infantry Regiment during its 15-month deployment in Iraq in 2007-08. In Thank You for Your Service, Finkel looks at after the war — at what happens when our soldiers (the Army’s Second Battalion) return home.
danibeliveau's review against another edition
5.0
"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's reporting offers vignettes into the lives of soldiers readjusting to life at home after experiencing physical and mental trauma during the Iraq war. It is an overwhelmingly, hopelessly bleak picture: brain injuries, suicide, spousal abuse, guilt, shame, depression, alcoholism, isolation, bureaucratic apathy. He documents widows left alone with young children and government payouts, and wives struggling to become caretakers to their husbands. What struck me most, though, was Finkel's demonstrations of the run-around veterans get while trying to take advantage of even their most basic benefits, the absurdity of the system that they depend on for their lives and livelihoods, especially considered alongside the gooey but empty sentiment which is the title of the book. Each story, I think, is selected and portrayed carefully to convey a very particular point. The overall effect is devastating.
In a time where the vast majority of our country is unaffected by war, a book like this is not just important: it is urgent. Every American should read it.
Finkel's reporting offers vignettes into the lives of soldiers readjusting to life at home after experiencing physical and mental trauma during the Iraq war. It is an overwhelmingly, hopelessly bleak picture: brain injuries, suicide, spousal abuse, guilt, shame, depression, alcoholism, isolation, bureaucratic apathy. He documents widows left alone with young children and government payouts, and wives struggling to become caretakers to their husbands. What struck me most, though, was Finkel's demonstrations of the run-around veterans get while trying to take advantage of even their most basic benefits, the absurdity of the system that they depend on for their lives and livelihoods, especially considered alongside the gooey but empty sentiment which is the title of the book. Each story, I think, is selected and portrayed carefully to convey a very particular point. The overall effect is devastating.
In a time where the vast majority of our country is unaffected by war, a book like this is not just important: it is urgent. Every American should read it.
jayspa65's review
challenging
emotional
informative
sad
medium-paced
4.0
A very enlightening read for me. The book follows the attempts at recovery of several Iraq war vets who were traumatized by their experience. The author does a great job of relating and interweaving the endeavors and difficulties of the vets, their wives, and the VA staff who treat them. For sure it is not pretty and the discord and anger within the families is near constant.
This is just raw material that brings you right into daily lives, and the author does not apply any spin nor look for good or bad actors. You get to witness the good intentions as well as the self centered tendencies that lead to anger and dysfunctional behavior by both the vets and their wives. It's not explored explicitly but one can only imagine the trauma visited on their young children at such a vulnerable age.
Good writing and it is engaging to read, though it can feel relentlessly heavy at times. Your heart will open up.
This is just raw material that brings you right into daily lives, and the author does not apply any spin nor look for good or bad actors. You get to witness the good intentions as well as the self centered tendencies that lead to anger and dysfunctional behavior by both the vets and their wives. It's not explored explicitly but one can only imagine the trauma visited on their young children at such a vulnerable age.
Good writing and it is engaging to read, though it can feel relentlessly heavy at times. Your heart will open up.
everydayreading's review against another edition
3.0
This was hard to listen to (sad, in lots of parts, and also a ton of swearing), but so fascinating and worthwhile.
scrabblerz's review against another edition
4.0
Powerful, enlightening, heartbreaking read. What a mess we are in. And how disconnected from the ongoing costs of war most of us are.
8little_paws's review against another edition
5.0
If I had to choose required reading for all living in the US, it would be this book and The Good Soldiers (this is a sequel to that book). This book gets you into the life of living with someone suffering from PTSD or TBI due to the war in Iraq. Absolutely riveting, heartbreaking.
heatherberm's review
5.0
This book is, in a word, devastating. Finkel wrote about being embedded with the men of the 2-16 in his previous book, "The Good Soliders." In "Thank You for Your Service," he checks in with a few of them as they struggle to reintegrate into life at home.
The main figures in the book are Adam Schuman, a solider evacuated mid-deployment because of mental health issues that have overtaken him during his third trip to Iraq, and his wife, Saskia. Schuman struggles with many of the things that I've read about in other articles about this kind of thing: angry outbursts, paranoia, extremely high frustration, lack of motivation, nightmares, suicidal thoughts, and an overabundance of medications to help him deal with all of the above. For me, the most interesting part of the book was Saskia's story. I don't think we hear as much detail about what the wives of these soldiers experience and it's pretty harrowing at times. On one hand, she wants to do everything she can to support him as he tries to heal, on the other hand she wants him to just be better already. On one hand, she knows she needs to be extra patient and loving, on the other hand she's as angry and frustrated as he is. When he first points a shotgun at his head and threatens to pull the trigger, she almost wants him to, just so it's all over. In the next second, she's panicked and desperate to get the gun away from him. She's trying to hold him together, trying to hold their children together, trying to hold herself together, trying to make sure money is coming in, that bills are getting paid, that the house is still standing around them. And she's doing all of this while dealing with the fact that the husband who came home to her is so different from the husband she sent off to Iraq that he may as well be another person. Extremely powerful stuff.
Finkel does check in throughout the book with some other people: a solider who was shot in the head and is learning to live with new physical and mental limitations, a widow who lost her husband during the war, and a widow who lost her husband to suicide during the after-war. Alcoholism, domestic abuse, divorce, suicide, PTSD, TBI, it's all here and all pretty awful. Finkel does look at different programs and treatments and what may contribute to certain people being particularly susceptible to PTSD. He also checks in with the Pentagon and how it's struggling to make sense of what's happening post-war and how it can best support soldiers like these and their families. They don't have a lot of answers, however.
Overall, definitely a bleak but needed reminder of just what we're asking of people when we send them off to war.
The main figures in the book are Adam Schuman, a solider evacuated mid-deployment because of mental health issues that have overtaken him during his third trip to Iraq, and his wife, Saskia. Schuman struggles with many of the things that I've read about in other articles about this kind of thing: angry outbursts, paranoia, extremely high frustration, lack of motivation, nightmares, suicidal thoughts, and an overabundance of medications to help him deal with all of the above. For me, the most interesting part of the book was Saskia's story. I don't think we hear as much detail about what the wives of these soldiers experience and it's pretty harrowing at times. On one hand, she wants to do everything she can to support him as he tries to heal, on the other hand she wants him to just be better already. On one hand, she knows she needs to be extra patient and loving, on the other hand she's as angry and frustrated as he is. When he first points a shotgun at his head and threatens to pull the trigger, she almost wants him to, just so it's all over. In the next second, she's panicked and desperate to get the gun away from him. She's trying to hold him together, trying to hold their children together, trying to hold herself together, trying to make sure money is coming in, that bills are getting paid, that the house is still standing around them. And she's doing all of this while dealing with the fact that the husband who came home to her is so different from the husband she sent off to Iraq that he may as well be another person. Extremely powerful stuff.
Finkel does check in throughout the book with some other people: a solider who was shot in the head and is learning to live with new physical and mental limitations, a widow who lost her husband during the war, and a widow who lost her husband to suicide during the after-war. Alcoholism, domestic abuse, divorce, suicide, PTSD, TBI, it's all here and all pretty awful. Finkel does look at different programs and treatments and what may contribute to certain people being particularly susceptible to PTSD. He also checks in with the Pentagon and how it's struggling to make sense of what's happening post-war and how it can best support soldiers like these and their families. They don't have a lot of answers, however.
Overall, definitely a bleak but needed reminder of just what we're asking of people when we send them off to war.