The Last Deployment
eBook - PDF

The Last Deployment

How a Gay, Hammer-Swinging Twentysomething Survived a Year in Iraq

  1. 223 pages
  2. English
  3. PDF
  4. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - PDF

The Last Deployment

How a Gay, Hammer-Swinging Twentysomething Survived a Year in Iraq

About this book

In 2003, after serving five and a half years as a carpenter in a North Dakota National Guard engineer unit, Bronson Lemer was ready to leave the military behind. But six months short of completing his commitment to the army, Lemer was deployed on a yearlong tour of duty to Iraq. Leaving college life behind in the Midwest, he yearns for a lost love and quietly dreams of a future as an openly gay man outside the military. He discovers that his father's lifelong example of silent strength has taught him much about being a man, and these lessons help him survive in a war zone and to conceal his sexuality, as he is required to do by the U.S. military.

            The Last Deployment is a moving, provocative chronicle of one soldier's struggle to reconcile military brotherhood with self-acceptance. Lemer captures the absurd nuances of a soldier's daily life: growing a mustache to disguise his fear, wearing pantyhose to battle sand fleas, and exchanging barbs with Iraqis while driving through Baghdad. But most strikingly, he describes the poignant reality faced by gay servicemen and servicewomen, who must mask their identities while serving a country that disowns them. Often funny, sometimes anguished, The Last Deployment paints a deeply personal portrait of war in the twenty-first century.

 
InSight Out Book Club selection
 
Bronson Lemer named one of Instinct magazine's Leading Men 2011
 
QPB Book Club selection

Finalist, Minnesota Book Awards

Finalist, Over the Rainbow Selection, American Library Association

Amazon Top Ten 10 Gay & Lesbian Books of 2011
 
 
 

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Yes, you can access The Last Deployment by Bronson Lemer in PDF and/or ePUB format. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Table of contents

  1. Contents
  2. Prologue
  3. 1. Olympic Hopefuls
  4. 2. Last Supper
  5. 3. Snow Bullets
  6. 4. Even Pawns Have Nice Legs
  7. 5. Click, Click, Click
  8. 6. The Mustache Race
  9. 7. All Sand and Stars
  10. 8. Wolves
  11. 9. This Is Our Comfortable Hell
  12. 10. Icarus in Iraq
  13. 11. Baghdad in My Boots
  14. 12. Don’t Tell
  15. 13. If Charles Bronson Were Here
  16. 14. How to Build Your Own Coffin
  17. 15. Two Toonies and a Loonie
  18. 16. Vets
  19. 17. Out Came a Spider
  20. 18. Dump Gulls
  21. Epilogue
  22. Acknowledgments