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Klay, Phil. Uncertain Ground: Citizenship in an Age of Endless, Invisible War. Penguin Pr. May 2022. 272p. ISBN 9780593299241. $27. lrg. prnt. Downloadable. ESSAYS

After serving in Iraq as an officer in the U.S. Marines, Klay returned home to produce two exceptional pieces of fiction shaped by his experience of war: the National Book Award–winning story collection Redeployment and the debut novel Missionaries, best-booked by the Wall Street Journal. Here he collects essays written over the past decade that explore what the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have really meant to the people of the United States, for whom the fighting itself has been essentially invisible. What are the consequences when only a small group of Americans—soldiers and their families—are impacted by war? How can civic duty be defined under such circumstances? Can the United States justly ask for such sacrifices? Why are these military actions kept under wraps? And how are these wars really affecting the country today?

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