Missionaries by Phil Klay

Missionaries

Phil Klay

This novel spans three decades of conflict in Iraq, Afghanistan and Colombia and tells the story through three main characters. Lisette is an American news reporter, Mason an American soldier turned military advisor, and Abel who is forced to become a child soldier after his family is killed. A complex story is pulled together and made so personal. Thought-provoking and timely.

Extract

The missions - chase down Taliban leaders here, train ANP there - did make sense. It was the war as a whole that was insane, a rational insanity that dissected the problem in a thousand different ways, attacked it logically with a thousand different mission sets, a million white papers, a billion "lesson learned" reports, and nothing even approaching coherent strategy.

Parallels
  • Dispatches by Michael Herr
  • Unholy Alliance by Simeon Hughes
  • Homeland - TV series
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Violence
Explicit sexual content