I’ve talked about The Junior Officers Reading Club: Killing Time and Fighting Wars – US link/ UK link by Patrick Hennessey before but as I have now actually read it all I will talk about it again. I loved the book. I have been out to Iraq and read many of the books about the two current wars and with Baghdad Business School – US link/ UK link by Heyrick Bond Gunning the Junior Officers Reading Club represent the best personal books about the Iraq conflict. It is an excellent first-hand account of a young enlistee’s transition from MTV loving student to professional soldier. Attempting to stave off the tedium and pressures of army life in the Iraqi desert by losing themselves in the dusty paperbacks on the transit-camp bookshelves, Hennessey and a handful of his pals from Sandhurst military academy form the Junior Officers’ Reading Club. By the time he reaches Afghanistan and the rest of the club are scattered across the Middle East, they are no longer cheerfully overconfident young recruits, hungering for action and glory. Hennessey captures how boys grow into men amid the frenetic, sometimes exhilarating violence, frequent boredom, and almost overwhelming responsibilities that frame a soldier’s experience and the way we fight today. It also explains the passion for violence inherent in these young men. The almost complete lack of fear – at least until the end of the firefight.

One slight complaint (made by many other as well on Amazon) is the misleading title. The Junior Officers Reading Club: Killing Time and Fighting Wars – US link/ UK link does not talk much about books. After these complaints Hennessey has appended his original London Review of Books article that originally inspired the book to my paperback copy. With that small proviso this is an excellent book and is highly recommended.