title: The Road Ahead: Fiction from the Forever War
author:  Adrian Bonenberger 
description: Savor each of the 24 distinctive tales by 24 veterans in a collection that makes you want to read more by the contributors.<br /> - <strong><em>Military Times</em></strong><br /><br />An anthology of stories covering a literary terrain as expansive as the seemingly endless 'war on terror' that spawned it. These stories provide plenty of revelation on the nature of the war and the soldiers who continue to fight it.<br /> - <strong><em>Kirkus Reviews</em></strong><br /><br />Most stories in <em>The Road Ahead</em> are told in a realistic mode, but suitable attention is paid to the surreal and disorienting elements of war and homecoming.<br /> - <strong><em>Milwaukee Journal Sentinel</em></strong><br /><br />Whatever image readers may have of veterans of the U.S. militarys seemingly never-ending engagement in Afghanistan, the ranks certainly included talented writers with sophisticated worldviews and ample amounts of self-awareness. That is reflected in nearly every one of the 24 stories collected in <em>The Road Ahead</em>.<br /> - <strong><em>San Antonio Express-News</em></strong><br /><br />Captures the truth about war better than nonfiction. Its possiblelikely eventhat these pages from a handful of writers will come to define the warrior perspective for this generation. For that reason, this book is relevant. Its stories are tragic, moving, violent, and devastating, but not always in the ways one expects. Its enough to enlighten those most insulated from the war.<br /> - <strong><em>Task &amp; Purpose</em></strong><br /><br />The writers gathered in these pages are among the finest, and the material they are working with is, by its nature, powerful and compelling. The result is stories that are by turns brutal and hilarious, dark and redemptive. Every one of them speaks to a truth we should not, cannot, turn away from.<br /> - <strong>Mary Roach, 'New York Times' bestselling author of 'Grunt: The Curious Science of Humans at War'</strong><br /><br />These twenty-four intimate, brutal, unusual and honest portraits show us the startling effects of war, dispelling the myth that any military solution is simple. To this diverse group of writers, women and men, I say thank you for your wrenching stories. The cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is greater than we could have imagined.<br /> - <strong>Bonnie Jo Campbell, author of 'Once Upon a River' and 'Mothers, Tell Your Daughters'</strong><br /><br /><em>The Road Ahead</em> more than lived up to its promisea shockingly brilliant salvo in the next wave of literature about our perpetual wars, a diverse and strange new literature which is utterly essential if we want to understand who we are as a nation, and what this era of constant war is doing to us, to our military, and to the countries where we send our men and women to kill and die.<br /> - <strong>Phil Klay, National Book Award Winning author of 'Redeployment'</strong><br /><br />If war is eternal, its form alters with the times. These vivid stories are the up-to-date bulletins from the frontline of today. Injustices abound, meaning eludes us, until for moments, it doesnt. These writers deliver gut-wrecking reports of humanity at the edge of despair and offer us truths about the nature of war and the men and women struggling to survive it.<br /> - <strong>Susan Minot, author of 'Thirty Girls and Evening'</strong><br /><br />A stunning, poignant, astonishing, mournful, melancholy, brutally honest collection of stories about our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and makes this old soldiers heart sore. They are so well written. If you want to understand our young soldiers and the world they lived in, read these stories.<br /> - <strong>Larry Heinemann, National Book Award-winning author of 'Paco's Story' and 'Black Virgin Mountain'</strong>
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  BEYOND ALL RECOGNITION
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  KENNETH EADE
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
    
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  This book is dedicated to the military men and women of the wars of my
  lifetime and the wars to come – ordinary heroes called upon to do things no
  person on earth should have to do.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “No one won the last war, and no one will win the next war.”  
  ― Eleanor Roosevelt
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  #  FOREWORD
  
  Some people who read this book will say that it is “leftist.” I choose not to
  put a label on things, because, in my opinion, nothing is ever black or white;
  only shades of grey. Some will say it is anti-war, which it admittedly is. But
  this book is really just a fictional story that has been weaved around real
  facts, all of which are available to anyone with Internet access. It is based
  upon leaked documents, news stories, and consultations with persons who were
  actually involved in war, as I have never been.
  
  
  To those who will say it