Now Available

The Deserter's Tale

An Excerpt

I know that many Americans have their minds made up about people like me. They think we are cowards who just couldn't take it. I don't blame them. I had my own mind made up about war deserters long before I set foot in Iraq. But I know right from wrong. I had a conscience by the age of six. I had to suspend it for a while in Iraq. Soldiers are taught that it is "Army first, God second, and family third." I am not a coward and I never flinched from danger. The easiest thing would have been to keep on doing what I was told to do. Ever so slowly, as the jets raced and the illumination rounds burned and the houses fell during the long Iraqi nights, my conscience returned. It could no longer be Army first, God second, and family third. It had to be the tiny voice inside me that would not sleep any longer. I am not this man, I told myself. I cannot do these things any longer.

Reviews

"The writing is fluid, crisp and compelling. The story is shocking."
The Montreal Gazette

"Joshua Key...is all of 28 years old and he's lived through more in life than most of us will live through in our entire lives...[an] incredibly intense read."
CBC Radio

"What is most engaging about this book is its essential honesty. The Deserter's Tale ought to be required reading for soldiers heading overseas..."
The Globe and Mail

"The Deserter's Tale...never pretends to be more than one man's account. Key does the math, as should the reader: If this is what one soldier saw in seven months, imagine the sum total of the inhumanity being perpetuated in Iraq."
The Toronto Star

"...destined to become part of the literature of the Iraq war…from the book's opening pages, Key's clear voice rings out, explaining why he deserted the Army after seven months in Iraq, with anguish and a frankness that invests the book with quiet eloquence."
Los Angeles Times