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A review by jwinchell
Purple Heart by Patricia McCormick
3.0
This is on the 2014 Abe list.
I struggle with Patricia McCormick... I absolutely loathed Never Fall Down; it felt appropriated, colonialist. With Purple Heart, once again she's done a lot of research and seems to have immersed herself in interviews with Iraq war vets and family members. She used the 3rd person to flesh out Matt's story of surviving an RPG with traumatic brain injury and his return to the front. And even though I was intrigued by Matt's story and horrified by the deeply layered "don't ask, don't tell" culture of the U.S. military, something about this entire book rang hollow. It felt journalistic. The moment she has Matt use the phrase "goofing off" to describe how he and his squad hang out, I thought: yep, this is a middle aged woman here. As we would say in YA class, there was way too much annoying "authorial intrusion."
That said, McCormick takes on an important issues that are relevant for today's teens: the ongoing war in Iraq, the draw of military service, young vets returning home and being sent back out to the front with traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress.
Young readers will be swept up in the mystery of what happened to Matt, to the little boy, with his friend Justin. We regain memory as Matt does--somewhat ok storytelling.
And now I'm going prioritize reading The Yellow Birds, National Book Award finalist, written by a veteran of the Iraq War. I think I value authenticity over research.
I struggle with Patricia McCormick... I absolutely loathed Never Fall Down; it felt appropriated, colonialist. With Purple Heart, once again she's done a lot of research and seems to have immersed herself in interviews with Iraq war vets and family members. She used the 3rd person to flesh out Matt's story of surviving an RPG with traumatic brain injury and his return to the front. And even though I was intrigued by Matt's story and horrified by the deeply layered "don't ask, don't tell" culture of the U.S. military, something about this entire book rang hollow. It felt journalistic. The moment she has Matt use the phrase "goofing off" to describe how he and his squad hang out, I thought: yep, this is a middle aged woman here. As we would say in YA class, there was way too much annoying "authorial intrusion."
That said, McCormick takes on an important issues that are relevant for today's teens: the ongoing war in Iraq, the draw of military service, young vets returning home and being sent back out to the front with traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress.
Young readers will be swept up in the mystery of what happened to Matt, to the little boy, with his friend Justin. We regain memory as Matt does--somewhat ok storytelling.
And now I'm going prioritize reading The Yellow Birds, National Book Award finalist, written by a veteran of the Iraq War. I think I value authenticity over research.