Friday, April 5, 2013

Greitens, Eric. The Warrior’s Heart.


Greitens, Eric.   The Warrior’s Heart.  Houghton Mifflin    2012  264p  $16.99  978-0-547-86852-3     hs/adult    Biography      VG-BN

Readers who enjoyed Greitens’ The Heart and the Fist will not be disappointed by the adaptation he has created from that book to appeal to teens in The Warrior’s Heart.  Part memoir and part second-person narrative, teenage readers will identify with Greitens and other characters in the book.  Though Greitens’ coming-of-age is uncommon, this is not a tale of boastful showboating  and egotistical self-promotion.

The Warrior’s Heart is the inspiring story of Eric Greitens, an average teenager who grows up over the course of the book as he
searches for his true calling.  Eric travels the globe as he serves, volunteering among the poor or in refugee camps in China, Croatia, Bolivia, Bosnia, and Rwanda.  He comes to realize that people need protection as well as humanitarian service (which often arrives well after the fact).  So after becoming a Rhodes Scholar, Duke Scholar, and boxing champion, Greitens joins the Navy SEALs.  SEAL training is brutal and intense.  The descriptions of Hell Week are gripping.  Deployed to Afghanistan, Greitens receives a medical discharge soon after his arrival there.

Greitens wants his readers to think like global citizens.  Each chapter opens with a “Choose Your Own Adventure” scenario (”What do you do?”).  Readers  inspired by the author’s strength, courage, and compassion may be inspired by the section
entitled “Your Mission” and may heed Greitens call to action, in which he challenges them to think about “a better way to walk in the world.”

Eric Greitens                                         --Hilary Welliver

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