Purple Heart Patricia McCormick Iraq war/ Relationships/trauma
Balzer and Bray 199 pp., 2009 ISBN 978-0-06-17390-0
Waking up in a hospital inside a Green Zone in Iraq, Matt finds a Purple Heart pinned on his blanket. Through the fog of his TBI, traumatic brain injury, Matt seeks to understand exactly what happened that day, and why he is haunted by the death of a young Iraqi boy whom he had befriended. Even with memory loss, headaches and an injured leg, Matt simply wants to return to his unit where his buddies are, and where he can feel understood. Count on McCormick who also brought us, Sold and Cut to write a well-researched and harrowing story of the realities of the Iraq war, and what young soldiers, not much older than our students, must face on a daily basis. An excellent, but not easy read which stays in the reader’s heart and mind long after the last page is re-read.
