In The Shadow of Greatness, Part 2

I posted a few days ago about my USNA class's book, In The Shadow of Greatness, that is going to be out on 15 August.  I was lucky enough to be able to purchase an advanced copy, and I couldn't put it down. I started it Monday morning on my way to work, and finished it last night. And I have to say, I am so incredibly proud to be able to call myself a member of the US Naval Academy class of 2002. I also fully understand why my story wasn't chosen to make the print edition of the book. The stories that did make it were all better than mine, no question.

Our class was the first to graduate from the Naval Academy after 9/11, and the first to graduate during a time of war in our lifetime. The stories contained in this book include so many different experiences of my classmates since that May day in 2002. We have the last female F-14 pilot, who shared how she was able to live her dream. We have an explosive ordinance disposal officer who lived in real life what was portrayed in the movie The Hurt Locker. We have someone who took advantage of the Blue to Green program (which I almost did myself) and transitioned to the Army, and then had the responsibility of delivering the casualty notifications to families of his soldiers killed in action. We have the first military member to legally marry after the repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell. We have a classmate who was commissioned into the Air Force and finally found her calling when she got out. We have four stories written by the mothers of classmates who have died since graduation, one of cancer, two in training accidents, and one (which is written by his mother but in his voice) of our only classmate to have been killed in action. And these are just a few of the examples of the stories contained in the book.

Bottom Line: I very highly recommend this book. And not just because I'm biased.

My story will be included on the book's website along with many others that were submitted but didn't make the print edition. They say the goal publication date for those stories is September 11, 2012. Appropriate, I think. I can't wait to read the rest of them.

All profits from the book will go to the U.S. Naval Academy Class of 2002, Inc., a 501(c)(3) (status pending) organization set up exclusively for charitable and education purposes that support education, training, and excellence within the Navy, Marine Corps, and veteran communities. Specific organizations that have been tagged to benefit include The Travis Manion Foundation, The Matt Freeman Project, Run To Honor, the Semper Fi Fund, Mission Continues, and the USMC Scholarship Fund.  It is available for preorder here, here, and here. Also, please go like the book's facebook page.

This is why I love books

I used to be a really avid reader. I taught myself to read at the age of four, and my kindergarten teacher basically let me choose my own reading curriculum because I was so far ahead of my peers. By the time we moved back to the States (middle of my 1st grade year) I had read almost every book on the "up through 4th grade" shelf in my school's library.  All the way through high school, I read all the time, because I didn't raelly need to study - school always came pretty easily for me.

When I hit USNA, that all changed. I was too exhausted to read, it would put me to sleep. And for the first time in my life, I didn't really have time to read for pleasure - I had to actually study. This continued through my years in the Navy - once I had my SWO pin, I read some books on deployment, but that was about it. I started reading a bit more when Matt's dad started sending me books, and I did the audiobook thing for a while. When I was unemployed, I read a bit more, but still not as much as I would have liked - I was broke, books aren't cheap!  Last fall, though, I decided to get myself a Kindle. I figured if I didn't have to go to the bookstore, maybe I'd read more. Its semi-working :)

A few months back, I joined a Book Club with a few ladies I met through Yelp!  The first few books we read were good, but the one we read for this month's meeting absolutely blew me (and the rest of us, based on the discussion we had) away.

Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea, by Barbara Demick, is one of the most compelling works of nonfiction I have ever read.  Demick, a reporter for the LA Times Seoul bureau, spent several years interviewing North Korean defectors, and profiled six of them for the book. She told their stories factually, with no agenda or attempt to bias a reader one way or the other. She stuck to the facts and the stories, with very little mention of what the average American thinks of North Korea - nuclear weapons. As someone who maintains a fairly tunnel-visioned view of North Korea based on my line of work, I can truly say that I was moved nearly to tears more than once in this book.

I'd forgotten what it was liked to really be moved by a book, to feel such a connection to the characters that you feel as if they're real people. In this book, they really are real people, yet the concept of what life in North Korea is like is so foreign to those of us that have grown up with the benefit of being Americans that it doesn't seem as though its possible. Books like this are why I love reading so much, and reading them makes me miss reading.

Do yourself a favor and get your hands on a copy of Nothing to Envy. Its not super long, and a fairly quick read. It doesn't read like non-fiction, in that the stories are really well told. You can get it on Amazon for under $10, hard copy or Kindle, and you should be able to get it at your local bookstore or library, although I hear a lot of libraries have pretty long waiting lists for it.