Kevin Powers' novel The Yellow Birds is based on his experiences in Iraq in 2004 and 2005. The book has been widely acclaimed by fellow authors and may well be the definitive 'Iraq novel.'
It hinges on traumatic events suffered by a group of US soldiers in Iraq in Nineveh province. The author himself was deployed as a machine-gunner in Mosul and Tal Afar in 2004 and 2005. His 226-page debut has been welcomed by his more experienced fiction-writing peers, including Colm Tóibín, who found it "deeply compelling."
But the author - who grew up in Richmond, Virginia - insists that The Yellow Birds is a work of the imagination. "The shape of the story, what the characters go through, the actions they take – all of that is work of the imagination and I thought it necessary for the kind of clarity I was hoping for," Powers recently told the Metro newspaper (London).
The story is told - largely in flash-back - by 30-year old veteran, John Bartle. Bartle, who enlisted, recalls his traumatic year spent as a raw 21-year-old on combat duty in Iraq. He was teamed up with 18-year old soldier Daniel Murphy, beter known as Murph.
Murph is a sensitive soul, and Bartle feels responsible, having made a rash promise to Murph's mother at the departure ceremony in the USA that he would look after the younger fellow.
Then there is Sergeant Sterling who veers between intelligent hyper-efficiency and slowly-creeping psychosis. Singing unintelligibly to himself, he scatters salt along the route as the platoon sneaks out to do battle in the eerie dawn light.
Bartle's imaginative, nuanced account of his experiences is particularly striking, and his thoughful responses will make the many readers he is guaranteed think calmly about the futile madness of war.
"It’s common to wonder why one person emerges unscathed, as I did, and others don’t, " Powers told Metro. "I’ve spent time thinking about it, though I didn’t have to endure the intensity of the guilt that the narrator, Bartle, suffers. I never discovered a satisfactory answer. It certainly didn’t come down to who deserved to live and who did not."
The Yellow Birds is published by Sceptre.
