Jinwar and other stories

Jinwar and Other Stories by Alex Poppe

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I met the author at a Chicago Writer's Association event where she read an excerpt of the title story. I found the excerpt and the reading moving enough that I tracked her down after the reading to get the details on the book, which I purchased.

It's a slim volume, but packed with emotion. The title story, Jimwar, is a story of rebirth and survival. Our unnamed narrator survived a rape in the military, and in the first chapter she meets her rapist and former CO in a VA hospital where she is working. He's lost both legs at the hip and she is charged with caring for him. It's a dramatic chapter. The rest of the chapters of Jinwar follow our narrator back to Iraq and Syria as an aid worker, albeit with a detour while working in a food truck.

Alex is a keen observer of the human condition, and her characters take no shit from anybody. The stories are gritty but interesting, and she always takes the side of the women in the world. I highly recommend this book.



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