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Original Title: | The Yellow Birds |
ISBN: | 0316219363 (ISBN13: 9780316219365) |
Edition Language: | English |
Characters: | Sterling, Bartle, Murph |
Setting: | Iraq |
Literary Awards: | New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award Nominee (2013), Guardian First Book Award (2012), PEN/Hemingway Foundation Award (2013), Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for Fiction (2013), Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction (2013) Dayton Literary Peace Prize Nominee for Fiction (2013), The Center for Fiction First Novel Prize Nominee (2012), Prix littéraire étranger Le Monde (2013), National Book Award Finalist for Fiction (2012) |
Kevin Powers
Hardcover | Pages: 226 pages Rating: 3.75 | 22875 Users | 3238 Reviews
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With profound emotional insight, especially into the effects of a hidden war on mothers and families at home, The Yellow Birds is a groundbreaking novel about the costs of war that is destined to become a classic. "The war tried to kill us in the spring," begins this breathtaking account of friendship and loss. In Al Tafar, Iraq, twenty-one-year old Private Bartle and eighteen-year-old Private Murphy cling to life as their platoon launches a bloody battle for the city. In the endless days that follow, the two young soldiers do everything to protect each other from the forces that press in on every side: the insurgents, physical fatigue, and the mental stress that comes from constant danger. Bound together since basic training when their tough-as-nails Sergeant ordered Bartle to watch over Murphy, the two have been dropped into a war neither is prepared for. As reality begins to blur into a hazy nightmare, Murphy becomes increasingly unmoored from the world around him and Bartle takes impossible actions. With profound emotional insight, especially into the effects of a hidden war on mothers and families at home, The Yellow Birds a groundbreaking novel about the costs of war that is destined to become a classic.
Mention Of Books The Yellow Birds
Title | : | The Yellow Birds |
Author | : | Kevin Powers |
Book Format | : | Hardcover |
Book Edition | : | First Edition |
Pages | : | Pages: 226 pages |
Published | : | September 6th 2012 by Little, Brown and Company |
Categories | : | Fiction. War. Historical. Historical Fiction. Military Fiction. Literary Fiction. Contemporary. Literature |
Rating Of Books The Yellow Birds
Ratings: 3.75 From 22875 Users | 3238 ReviewsDiscuss Of Books The Yellow Birds
Blurry and Vivid, At Times Agonizing, Gaze into Ponderous Reality of Veteran of War in IraqA splendid short novel looking into the mind of a combat soldier, the war he survived, and the murders of body and soul that he witnessed. The story offers perhaps an understanding, in part, of the military's escalated suicide rate now.Private Bartle, the protagonist, speaking of trying to cope with everyday existence back home:"You want to fall, that's all. You think it can't go on like that. It's as ifIve been sitting here thinking about what I want to write and tell you about this book, but its really.. really hard.. The storyline in itself isnt that hard.Its told from Johns POV. Hes thinking back to when he was in the military and stationed in Iraq in 2004/05. Hes thinking about his friend Murph and how a war can change a person.This in itself isnt that hard to explain, but I find it really hard to figure out if I liked it or not. And how do I review a book if I dont even know if I like it
The first lines of Kevin Powers The Yellow Birds announces that it intends to be a classic war novel, to be placed on the shelf somewhere between All Quiet on the Western Front and The Things They Carried: The war tried to kill us in the spring. As grass greened the plains of Nineveh and the weather warmed, we patrolled low-slung hills beyond the cities and towns. We moved over them and through the tall grass on faith, kneading paths into the windswept growth like pioneers. While we slept, the

Wow! I don't really know what to say about this book. The prose was a bit "fancy" for me but the story, I think, is very important. Being that the author was there, I'm assuming it is an accurate portrayal of the horrors of the war. It is such a sad and horrible story but also a very good story (does that make sense?). It is hard to imagine what these young men and women go through and then to come back here and try to live a "normal" life, seems almost impossible. This has been made into a
I really wanted to like this, having been drawn to the back story and - like a lamb to the slaughter - the 'All Quiet on the Western Front' analogies. Now obviously, there is great value in the account and its a strong addition to the growing Iraq novel genre. Theres also enough brutality and insight to make it a pretty hard-hitting read. What disappoints is that its all pretty disconnected and often just plain overwritten. To be generous, perhaps the idea of a solider-poet in the Iraq war is
Some people are just born to write. Kevin Powers, in this debut book, is certainly one of them. The Yellow Birds is breathtaking good, profoundly insightful and written with an incredible amount of emotional precision.Some might compare it to other war-themed books: The Naked and the Dead, All Quiet on the Western Front, The Things They Carried, or even A Separate Peace. They would, in my opinion, be misguided.This is not the quintessential book about the Iraqi War, even though the settings are
Id like to accord Kevin Powers book the same respect I give him and all our vets back from Iraq, but a book isnt a man and a book doesnt automatically earn my deference and appreciation. I didnt dislike the novel, and I tried liking it harder even to the point of starting it for a second read as soon as I finished it. I love its opening paragraphs (shades of Hemingway there, I thought), but after that I had a hard time warming to the book which felt to me as if it was trying too hard in all its
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