'In this incredibly moving sequel, Finkel reconnects with some of the men of the 2-16 — now home on American soil — and brings their struggles powerfully to life … Told in crisp, unsentimental prose and supplemented with excerpts from soldiers’ diaries, medical reports, e-mails, and text messages, their stories give new meaning to the costs of service — and to giving thanks.'
Publishers Weekly, starred review
'Thank You for Your Service is an almost unbearably sad book. It is also one I would urge you to read, to begin to appreciate the appalling toll war takes on troops ... Finkel is an extraordinarily compassionate writer.'
Matthew Ricketson, The Weekend Australian
Every politician must read this book before sending their country’s soldiers into battle.
Dear soldier, before going to war, read this book.
To understand the damage done by war, read this.
Barry Heard
'I’m urging everyone I know to give Thank You for Your Service just a few pages, a few minutes out of their busy lives. The families honoured in this urgent, important book will take it from there.'
Katherine Boo, National Book Award–winning author of Behind the Beautiful Forevers
'Thank You for Your Service is one of the best and truest books I have ever read. David Finkel cuts through all the spin, the excuses, the blowhard politics and mind-deadening metrics to discover the cost of war for the soldiers who fight it and the families they come home to. This extraordinary book will piss you off and break your heart. It will shame you and lift you up. It will bend your mind to the reality of an American war that is now well into its second decade.'
Ben Fountain, author of Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk, winner of the National Book Critics’ Circle Award and finalist for the National Book Award
'A vivid, fly-on-the-wall account of American soldiers, returned from Iraq, as they and their families struggle to cope with the after-effects of traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder.'
Lia Mills, Irish Times 'Books of the Year 2014'
‘Harrowing … heartbreaking … an antidote to the reductive and sentimentalised notions of the heroic that grew up, especially, in the post-9/11 environment.’
The Irish Times
‘A stunningly intimate portrayal of young veterans and their families haunted by a soul-corroding legacy of combat.’
Literary Review
‘Remarkable reporting … An essential history for anyone judging the cost of drawn-out conflicts or the long-term sacrifices of those who serve in them … Masterfully done.’
FT
‘Harrowing’
Geoff Dyer, The Guardian
‘David Finkel tells with novelistic immediacy the stories of some of the soldiers he met when embedded in eastern Baghdad with a US infantry battalion in 2007-8 … Moving.’
The Telegraph
‘A remarkable feat of reporting’
Sunday Times
‘His reporting is astonishingly intimate yet utterly respectful, taking us inside the hearts and minds of these men and their families.’
Colette Bancroft, Tampa Bay Times
‘Finkel sketches a panoramic view of postwar life, which includes not just soldiers … He bears witness, seemingly never sugarcoating or judging either the horrors these soldiers are subjected to by ghosts and guilt, or the ones they themselves inflict upon their loved ones. It is a book that every American should read to understand why our easily offered expressions of gratitude — as suggested by the book’s title — are insufficient. Whatever one thinks about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, we as a society in no small way caused this pain and inflicted these scars. Trying to understand is the very least we can do.’
Jake Tapper, Los Angeles Times
‘This is not — nor should it be — an easy book. But it is an essential one.’
Elizabeth D. Samet, The New York Times Book Review
‘Embedded with the veterans, their families, their friends, and their counsellors, Finkel lights up the lives of these struggling souls, who often compound their real problems by convincing themselves they’re “weak” for “abandoning” their buddies and seeking treatment … Vivid, compelling, heartrending.’
Jeff Stein, Bookforum
‘Together with its masterful prequel The Good Soldiers, [Thank You for Your Service] measures the wages of the war in Iraq — the wages of war, period — as well as anything I've read … [Finkel] atones for our scant attention by paying meticulous heed.’
Frank Bruni, The New York Times
‘[A] stunning, moving, subdued masterpiece of a book.’
Craig Fehrman, The Christian Science Monitor
‘On the surface, Finkel tells a largely conventional, sentimental story of those we’ve come to know as “wounded warriors”, but thanks to a subtext running through the book, it would be difficult for a reader not to take a hard look at these men who are, without question, angry and hurting and damaged … Thank You for Your Service will be justly hailed as an essential book for understanding all that came after for the soldiers who occupied Iraq. It’s an important chronicle of American veterans in an age of perpetual war.’
Nick Turse, The San Francisco Chronicle
‘Finkel chronicles what he calls the “after-war”, taking us along as soldiers from the same battalion struggle to find peace at home. They struggle with depression and anxiety and nightmares. They struggle with post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury, better known as PTSD and TBI. They struggle to reconnect with their families and their previous selves. And in an after-war as dangerous as this, with suicides outpacing combat deaths, they struggle to stay alive … Finkel’s book is, in every sense, exceptional — exceptional for its commitment, its compassion and its execution. It is public service, a book built on extraordinary access, with reporting so relentless and writing so fine and spare that our understanding of war’s enduring cost is forever changed.’
Ken Armstrong, The Seattle Times
‘Finkel’s writing is as haunting as his subject. His descriptions are taut and incisive … But what moved this reader most was Finkel’s use of his subjects’ voices to narrate.’
Tom Glenn, The Washington Independent Review of Books
‘It’s a testament to Finkel’s considerable journalistic skills that this is no sentimental or clichéd work. His vivid descriptions of the minutiae of everyday life provide a fly-on-the-wall observation without judgement. The struggles of the modern soldier that many us have heard about (and some of us have written about) are painted more vividly and intimately than we’ve experienced before.’
Mark Brunswick, The Minneapolis Star Tribune
