Unknown Soldiers

by: Neil Hanson

Published by: Vintage Books

Reviewed by Julie Failla Earhart

Subtitled: The Story of the Missing of the First World War

When I agreed to review Neil Hanson’s book, I expected something far, far different. Something perhaps more along the lines of an epistolary format or the utilization of a more conventional fictional format. What I got was a meticulously researched, well-written, captivating horrifying, narrative history that took me to the Somme in 1916. Hanson focused on three soldiers: A Briton, a German, and an American. “Their tracks, faint as smoke in the wind, intersect time and again, but they are united only in death, for each was killed on the Somme, within gunshot sound of each other.”

Hanson uses more than the diaries and letters to explain the cost of war from the soldier’s point of view. He researched the heck out of this battle, topic, and time as evident by the 96 pages of footnotes.

In an essence, Hanson is giving faces to the three million unaccounted-for soldiers from WWI. He also explains how the world remembers those unknown soldiers ever since. “The grieving families of such men were deprived even of the consolation of a funeral and a grave site, and for them, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier became the grave and the gravestone of their lost loved ones. In almost every combatant nation, an unknown solider was also buried at some national shrine and, just as in America, at once became the focus of a pilgrimage that continues to this day

I admit that, as a predominately fiction reader, the quote marks around quoted passages versus dialogue sometimes tripped me, as did the switch in point of view with a sentence. I had to often re-read paragraphs, sometimes, chapters, to be sure of what was happening. But the structure works—well, very well. I came away from this book with a new respect for fighting men and women everywhere. I also came away with an intimate new knowledge of trench warfare that on one level I’m not sure that I wanted to know but on another level compelled me to keeping reading.

I thought I kind of knew what WWI was like, but I had no idea. This book should be compulsory reading in every high school or college worldwide.

Armchair Interviews says: An eye-opening story of the soldiers of World War I. Check his web site to see what else he has written.

Author’s Web site: http://www.NeilHanson.co.uk