Brief synopsis:
Frankie is a naive young woman from a conservative small town in Southern California when a throwaway comment sees her signing up to serve her country as an army nurse in Vietnam. When she loses her brother to the war and his friend tells her that women can be heroes too she embarks on a journey which takes her into a world where the rules as she knows them don’t apply and into a life she could never have imagined. Both harrowing and empowering, her time in Vietnam opens her eyes to love, loss and the futility of war, leaving her traumatised and stigamtised as she returns home to a disapproving family and a country which refuses to acknowledge her contribution to the war. As Frankie unravels in the midst of ptsd, relationship traumas, personal losses and addictions it’s the friendships forged during war which help her survive her darkest days. This is a book which shines a light on the unthinkable inequalities and prejudices faced by female veterans at that time and is both shocking and life affiriming in its honesty.
Key themes:
War
Addiction
Trauma
Friendship
Gender expectations
Patriarchal Societies
Read this book when: you want to delve deep into a place and time in history which highlights some of the worst inequalities women have endured in our lifetime and which gives long awaited recognition to some exceptional heroines.
