By William M. Decker
Losing Francis: Essays on the War at Home should take its place among the most important recent narratives of US military family life. In clear, courageous, and eloquent prose, Robert Sommer documents what it’s like for parents and siblings to endure, day by day, and hour by hour, not only their loved one’s overseas tour of duty, but that loved one’s perilous return to a homeland that cannot possibly understand the veteran’s trauma and that is grossly unprepared to address the challenges of re-entry. This is a book that needs to be read by legislators and ordinary citizens who, unless they have a more or less direct link to those we have called upon to fight the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere, can form no conception of the burdens our soldiers and their families are asked to bear.
Losing Francis illuminates one of the great social invisibilities of contemporary American life. It should be on everyone’s list of 2018/2019 must-read titles.
