Reviews

Ayres asserts from his opening sentences that he is a coward. But this sometimes amusing, often harrowing but poorly organized account of war life makes it clear he is anything but a wimp: he is stuffed inside the confines of a Humvee, digs foxholes in the desert and watches Iraqis blown apart or incinerated (and fears the same will happen to him; he clutches a can of diazepam to commit suicide if he is struck by nerve gas). He reported from Iraq for the London Times from 2002 to 2003 and asserts that he takes no point of view on the war, yet the tone of his story is highly uncritical of the war, and his epilogue (alas, now hopelessly out of date) puts the U.S. firmly in control of the battlefield and describes the insurgency as on the wane. The book's strengths lie in Ayres's details of the gritty, hot, lonely daily grind; its weakest aspect is the too-long tangent of his rise as a young reporter. Ayres's gratitude at surviving his tour is palpable, as he writes, "Now that I know what war is like, I've stopped worrying about death.... I made it home. I'm still alive." Agent, George Lucas. (Aug.) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

In 2003, Ayres was transformed from an L.A.-based British business reporter for the London Times to an embedded correspondent in Iraq because he was afraid to say no when his boss asked if he'd like to go to war. Though initially terrified-he discovered that a $5000 "advance against expenses" was for use as ransom money in case of kidnapping-Ayres slowly accepted his assignment. He uses flashback to revisit his time as a reporter in New York City (on 9/11) and then describes the preparation in L.A. for his assignment. Seemingly mundane tasks, such as buying a bright yellow tent that he later finds would attract unwanted attention in the desert, come alive in his colorful writing. Though other embedded reporters have written books, Ayres is unique in his humor-driven and slightly sarcastic slant. In the end, he was embedded in Kuwait and Iraq for less than a month and on the front lines for a total of nine days; he has no heroic pretensions and offers little opinion about the conflict. Some readers might be offended by his tone. Recommended for larger public libraries seeking to collect comprehensively on the conflict. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 4/15/05.]-Leigh Mihlrad, Albert Einstein Coll. of Medicine of Yeshiva Univ., Bronx, NY Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.