Brave Deeds

June 5, 2017
Army veteran Abrams (Fobbit) returns to the Iraq War in his second novel, which tells the story of six AWOL American soldiers defying orders by crossing Baghdad to attend the funeral of their squad leader, Sgt. Rafael Morgan. It’s a journey made more difficult by the fact that their stolen Humvee has broken down and they now have to cross hostile territory on foot, mapless and without a radio or medic. During these tension-filled hours, we get to know the squad members: new leader Arrow, who is beginning to have doubts about his sexual orientation; Cheever, the overweight screwup; Park, “our quiet one”; Fish, the twitchy FNG (“fucking new guy”); Drew, who dreams of being unfaithful to his wife back home; and O, short for Olijandro, who is everyone’s friend. Their personal mission is interrupted by the search for a bomb factory, a diversion that turns unexpectedly bloody. The journey is also punctuated with nightmarish flashbacks to earlier in the war and the heroic act that cost Sgt. Morgan his life, and glimpses of civilian life. It all builds to an emotionally wrenching and tension-filled climax as the squad attempts to crash the funeral in a hijacked civilian van. Filled with vivid characterizations and memorable moments, this novel—as with classic modern war literature from John Hersey’s Into the Valley to David Halberstam’s One Very Hot Day—turns a single military action into a microcosm of an entire war. Agent: Nat Sobel, Sobel Weber Associates.

July 1, 2017
Abrams (Fobbit, 2012) follows his award-winning debut with a more empathetic but no less bitter take on the Iraq War.In the Land of Not Good, Staff Sgt. Raphael Morgan, "dismembered but not disremembered," has been killed by an improvised explosive devise, "obscene pieces of him flying through the bomb-bloom air." A band of brothers, troops he led, has decided to attend his memorial service at FOB Saro across Baghdad from their Taji camp. However, officers have denied permission. That's irrelevant to troopers Arrow, Park, Drew, O, Cheever, and Fish. They steal a Humvee and go AWOL. The Humvee breaks its drive shaft, and the six, edging past death at every door, must hoof it across the "chaotic center of terrorism" amid "al-Qaeda, Mahdi, Ba'ath, and Badr clashing their ideologies and ambitions of evil." Abrams offers an unusual narrative, first person plural, with points of view discernible only by process of elimination, a subtle reframing of the Rashomon effect. Chapters are long and short, one a mere 38 words, another a prose poem that's an homage to legs, the infantryman's mode of transportation. With multiple narrators, each trooper is seen through a different squad member's eyes. There's Arrow, distant son of more distant parents, who falls naturally into a leadership role, or the Hajji-hating Fish, years of promotions and demotions turning him into the private soldier with a "shine of gray at his temples" and the ability to shoot prisoners without remorse. As the six march across Baghdad, the heat, dust, and broken buildings stand as warnings until the action explodes in short, spare declarative sentences, every bullet another shot at the cruel and illogical aspects of war. A powerful story on its surface, a soldier's story laced with vulgarities and gallows humor, but also a story holding deeper interpretations of our troubled Middle Eastern misadventures.

COPYRIGHT(2017) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

July 1, 2017
In Fobbit (2012), Abrams caricatured military personnel who avoided combat overseas. His second novel confronts another underexplored aspect of war: the unlikely bonds formed by mutinous allegiance. Six soldiers steal a Hummer and sneak off base to attend their esteemed commander Rafe's memorial service. Then their vehicle breaks down in the heart of Baghdad. In a city where everyone is a potential enemy, the men risk their careers, and their lives, to get to the service on foot. Battling hunger and paranoia, the squad episodically recalls their daring adventure and Rafe's violent demise, portraying a complex man who secretly cared for stray dogs and avenged the deaths of innocent victims. Sharing their stories as a collective voice, each man bears his own burden: there's the notorious overeater, Cheever; impulsively violent Fish; Park the stoic; desperately romantic O, who can't get over his ex; Drew, who married the wrong woman; and their sententious makeshift leader, Arrow, who spurs them on. Just when the squad's plights become darkly, hilariously absurd, Abrams surprises with pathos and tenderness. This is military fiction at its truest.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)

Starred review from April 15, 2017

In Abrams's second novel (after the well-received Fobbit), a group of six soldiers in the Iraq War attend the funeral service of their dead sergeant, which involves stealing a vehicle and essentially going AWOL. The Humvee breaks down in the middle of war-torn Baghdad, and the group ends up getting lost walking to their destination. Somewhere along the way they raid a house they have been told is a bomb factory. Gunshots are exchanged, several people wind up dead, and one of the officers is wounded. After the raid, the soldiers steal a car, and with their injured comrade and a very pregnant Iraqi woman who joins them on the way, they make progress toward the base. Yet getting past the entrance there proves to be one of the most dangerous events of the day. VERDICT Describing the soldiers' perilous journey while filling in details of their backgrounds and the military situation in Iraq, this excellent novel is believable, dramatic, and also quite funny. [See Prepub Alert, 2/20/17.]--James Coan, SUNY at Oneonta Lib.

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 15, 2017

A New York Times Notable Book, Barnes & Noble pick, and finalist for the Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction, Abrams's Fobbit was among the first in a long line of fiction by soldier writers of the Middle East wars. This second work features six soldiers who've gone AWOL to attend the funeral of their leader, with their personal flaws and deepest worries revealed as they work their way across war-shattered Baghdad. Big ALA push.

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 15, 2017

In Abrams's second novel (after the well-received Fobbit), a group of six soldiers in the Iraq War attend the funeral service of their dead sergeant, which involves stealing a vehicle and essentially going AWOL. The Humvee breaks down in the middle of war-torn Baghdad, and the group ends up getting lost walking to their destination. Somewhere along the way they raid a house they have been told is a bomb factory. Gunshots are exchanged, several people wind up dead, and one of the officers is wounded. After the raid, the soldiers steal a car, and with their injured comrade and a very pregnant Iraqi woman who joins them on the way, they make progress toward the base. Yet getting past the entrance there proves to be one of the most dangerous events of the day. VERDICT Describing the soldiers' perilous journey while filling in details of their backgrounds and the military situation in Iraq, this excellent novel is believable, dramatic, and also quite funny. [See Prepub Alert, 2/20/17.]--James Coan, SUNY at Oneonta Lib.

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.