October Not Fiction Book Discussions

The Good Soldiers by David Finkel is the College of Charleston's 2014-2015 The College Reads! book selection. Between January 2007 and June 2008, Finkel spent eight months with the United States Army soldiers of the 2-16 Infantry Battalion in Iraq as they took part in the campaign know as "the surge." What is the true story of the surge? And was it really a success? These are the questions Finkel's unflinching third-person narrative poses to its readers as it follows Lieutenant Colonel Ralph Kauzlarich and the men and women in his charge through the violence, tension, and loss of armed conflict and its aftermath. Finkel writes, "my intent was to document their corner of the war, without agenda. This book, then, is that corner, unshaded." Finkel will speak on the College of Charleston's campus on Tuesday, October 14, 2014. There will be a public lecture at 7:00pm in Sottile Theatre. For more information, visit The College Reads! website. We hope you will take advantage of this wonderful opportunity to hear him speak about his work.

The Not Fiction Book Discussion read The Good Soldiers in 2010, and this month we are reading Thank You for Your Service, in which Finkel follows many of the men we met in The Good Soldiers home as they attempt to reintegrate into their families and into American society while struggling with Traumatic Brain Injury, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, survivor's guilt, and a profound sense of loneliness.  In this work, Finkel asks 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? Kirkus Reviews calls Thank You for Your Service "one of the most morally responsible works of journalism to emerge from the post-9/11 era." We hope you will join the discussion: Tuesday, October 7, at 6:30 p.m. at Main Library; Thursday, October 16, at 11:00 a.m. at West Ashley Branch Library; and here on the blog.