From the editor of the national bestseller WAR LETTERS,
comes an even more extraordinary collection of rare and
previously-unpublished wartime correspondence:

 

 

Behind The Lines
Powerful and Revealing American and Foreign War Letters
and One Man's Search to Find Them

ISBN: 0743256166
Author: Andrew Carroll
Publisher: Scribner

For the Behind the Lines "Reading Group Guide," please click here.

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For information about Andrew Carroll's previous bestseller, WAR LETTERS, please click here.  

Early Raves and Reviews for BEHIND THE LINES

Behind the Lines is an extraordinary achievement, a compendium of voices at once immediate and timeless, heart-breaking and entertaining. Andrew Carroll bears witness to cataclysm by allowing participants to speak for themselves, achieving an evocative power rare even in the best war literature. — Rick Atkinson, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of An Army at Dawn: The War in North Africa, 1942-1943

There are two vastly different ways of studying war. One has to do with the great story of history and of nations, the other with dying alone in a field hospital; with missing someone so much it aches; with wrestling down fear and shoring up courage; or enduring war?s squalor and absurdity. Andrew Carroll studies the human side of war in this stirring, moving, and sometimes hilarious collection. Behind the Lines is a tribute to the human spirit.
— Mark Bowden, author of Black Hawk Down

This book is more than a collection of newly-discovered war letters. There is something deeper, richer, and more intense at work here. Each letter is extraordinary in its own right, but together they illuminate war as it is rarely seen. Most importantly, Behind the Lines is the result of Andrew Carroll's unprecedented trip around the world to seek out these gripping, insightful, and, in so many cases, breathtaking letters. This is a book born of great passion. This is a book with tremendous heart and soul.
— James Bradley, author of Flags of Our Fathers and Flyboys

From the American Revolution to Iraq, everything is here: the terror and exhilaration of bloody combat, love letters, funny letters, letters from civilians caught in the middle of war. Behind the Lines is worth savoring; you can dip into it at any page and find something fascinating.
— Joseph L. Galloway, co-author of We Were Soldiers Once...and Young and Triumph Without Victory: The History of the Persian Gulf War

This book is absolutely majestic. The letters may be about war, but taken together they are about far more than conflict. They provide an unblinking look at the best and worst that human beings can do to each other, and in so doing transcend themselves. They become the colors with which Andrew Carroll has created a kind of historical art.
— McKay Jenkins, author of The Last Ridge: The Epic Story of America's First Mountain Soldiers and the Assault on Hitler's Europe

In all my years of military service, I don't believe I have ever read a book that has moved me as profoundly as this one. While it is often the generals and military leaders who receive the limelight, Andrew Carroll's Behind the Lines reminds us that it is the individual troops in the field and their loved ones at home who most deserve our admiration and attention. Behind the Lines is a candid look at the fierce realities of warfare, but it is also a lasting tribute to those who have fought—and continue to fight—for freedom. I cannot recommend this book more highly.
—Lieutenant General Claudia Kennedy, US Army (retired), the highest ranking woman in the history of the American armed forces

There is nothing more powerful then words written when life as you know it hangs in the balance. From soldiers on the front lines writing to sweethearts and family, to resistance fighters and so many others in the midst of war and its aftermath, Behind The Lines has letters from every conflict since the Revolution representing just about every race and many different cultures. This book is phenomenal and a must read.
— Yvonne Latty, author of We Were There: Voices of African American Veterans from World War II to the War in Iraq

All material © Copyright The Legacy Project, 2008