At twenty-one, soldier Bartle is sent to fight in the Iraq war, along with an eighteen-year-old fellow soldier Murphy, whom he has taken over from the very beginning. Narrated through the eyes of Bartle, The Yellow Birds tells firsthand the nonsense of a war waged under a fierce sun, fighting a ubiquitous enemy, in cities turned into ghosts. Among many other things, the war forever robs Bartle of his present, since he will be trapped by the terrifying memories that torment him, trying to understand actions that at distance no longer resemble his or anyone else's. The yellow birds have been compared to great war novels as those written by Ernest Hemingway, Erich Maria Remarque, Norman Mailer and Tim O'Brien. Kevin Powers combines knowledge that is only acquired in its own right with elegant prose with poetic descriptions that cause the reader to be transported to the battlefield and li...read more
