This page is about a book containing the true-life experiences of a bunch of soldiers, marines and medics who survived Iraq. It’s here, because as the author who put it together I want the troops’ peers to have a chance at understanding what they went through by going off to war. My own son is twenty-four, about the same age as many of the guys in the book and I can’t really imagine what it would be like for him to serve in a place like Iraq.
I wrote What Was Asked Of Us because there was a big gap between the returning soldiers and the country that sent them off to fight. The American public wasn’t being told the whole truth about Iraq, at least not what I was hearing from the soldiers. The sheer level of violence they described, their frequent encounters with body parts following the detonation of IEDs and attacks by suicide bombers dismayed me. Their deteriorating relationship with the Iraqi people they had liberated suggested the American presence in Iraq was accelerating the growth of the insurgency.
I heard a number of stories about the accidental killing of civilians at roadside checkpoints but I also heard stories of heroism and committed brotherhood.
I recorded their stories on broadcast quality equipment and you can listen to some of what they have to say.
A talented neighborhood musician who calls himself the Skelton Hand read galleys of What Was Asked Of Us and has written a song in tribute to the troops who are profiled.
Little, Brown and Company, New York, will publish the book on November 2nd, 2006. I will be traveling around the U.S. with Garett, Jon, Alan and some other soldiers from the book along with Bobby Muller, a very cool Vietnam Veteran who wrote the introduction to WWAOU. We have dates in Atlanta, Chicago, Boston and Tacoma with more on the way. I’ll post the information on the tour soon and I hope you’ll come and meet these remarkable people.
the book was amazing. i cried many times. thank you for writing this, i appritiate it. i only hope i cqan end up to be half as brave as the men and women who fought for us in iraq and afganistan.
Was on my way out when CSPAN is (re)broadcasting your presentation at the Austin Book Festival of 11/07, so am watching it before I go. So glad you had this opportunity to bring Paul and Chris' accounts forward once again. Your book is on myspace and I continue to recommend it to any and all. Thanks again for the fine job.
Hi there What Was Asked of Us first of all we'd like to say thanks for being our myspace pal. We wanted to make sure you knew the reason incase we suddenly vanish off of your friends list. The movement we've started for indie artists has grown significantly and consumes all of our time these days. We seldom sign into our myspace account and this is making several people believe that we are ignoring them. We are not ignoring anyone, we wanted everyone to know that. What we're doing has become so busy we just don't have the time for myspace any longer, so in all honesty we are probably going to just close our myspace account.
Many people wanted to use us in the future so if you were one of those people make sure you bookmark the link below so that in the event that we do close our myspace account you won't loose contact with us. I wish you the best of luck in your music career. Thanks again for being our myspace pal.
Dan, this is some serious stuff man. I'm going to have to read this book when it hits the shelves. Kudos to everyone who is getting this important message out.
