Losing Francis: Essays on the Wars at Home - Softcover

Sommer, Robert F.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 194438846X ISBN 13: 9781944388461

Publisher: Fomte, 2018

Synopsis

While Sgt. Francis D. Sommer was fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, his father stood on a street corner in Kansas City with an antiwar sign. Losing Francis: Essays on the Wars at Home reconciles that seeming contrast in a courageous dive into the personal cost of America's wars. Fusing his eloquent meditations on nature, art, and grief with the political and social backdrop of these wars, Robert F. Sommer exposes the disconnect between the world of war and the universe of no-war in a nation that often seems preoccupied only with amusing itself. He skillfully weaves a compelling narrative throughout these essays in the finely-honed prose of a master craftsman.

About this title

About the Author:

Robert F. Sommer is the author of two novels, Where the Wind Blew (Wessex 2008) and A Great Fullness (Fomite 2016). His essays and stories have appeared in many literary and scholarly journals. Robert is a lecturer at the University of Saint Mary, Leavenworth, and works for the Sierra Club's Kansas Chapter in support of its mission to explore, enjoy, and protect the planet.

Review:

Robert F. Sommer's book of essays, Losing Francis, offers a unique and urgent contribution to the literature of the Bush wars. After deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, Sommer's son battled hearing loss, kidney damage, and a deep sense of moral unease about his war experiences, before dying in a car accident. This powerful recounting of one veteran's life doubles as a history of the Bush era, told by a watchful father, torn between love for his son, and distrust of the wars he's been sent to fight. Both harrowing and lovely, Losing Francis is a vibrant, indispensable document of life in our time. --Whitney Terrell, author of The Good Lieutenant

A poignant account of one couple's journey through the shadow cast by the death of their son. Inextricably woven into the story is the nefarious reality of the nation's ruinous recent wars. A compelling and insightful book. --Mark Karlin, Editor, BuzzFlash at Truthout

Sommer's prose often rises to the poetic, his storytelling is poignant yet never sentimental, and his unflinching honesty in relating his son's life and death leave the reader with a lump in the throat and a righteous anger. Losing Francis will surely take its earned place in the lamentably-large library of great literature of the home front. --Jeanetta Calhoun Mish, Oklahoma State Poet Laureate 2017-18, author of What I Learned at the War

About this edition

• Publisher: Fomte
• Publication date: 2018
• ISBN 10: 194438846X
• ISBN 13: 9781944388461
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 295