The Women
Written by Kristin Hannah
Originally published in 2024
~480 pages
Rate 5/5
Despite having watched Forest Gump at an old enough age to understand the plot of the show I didn't realize why Lutetian Dan was treated so terribly if he was a veteran. This book opened my eyes to a dark part of American history. It shouldn't be a spoiler alert to find out that America should not have been apart of the Vietnam War.
Not long after a close relative of Frankie's passes away in the War, does she enlists as an army nurse. However, since she is a woman, her parents aren't proud of her in the same way they were proud of her brother. In her parents eyes, she should be worried about getting married, serving her country in that way, not by enlisting.
In short, this book is about a woman's perspective on the Vietnam War. A time where there were protests upon protests namely, the war protest, the feminist movement, the gay rights movement, the human rights movement, among others.
In my opinion...
"Women weren't in Nam." What a blood boiling statement. I don't doubt that the women who fought for their country during that time didn't hear that at least once. I think it's incredibility dangerous to sit and compare a combat veterans experience to a nurses experience in general it doesn't matter if it's a man or a woman. Countless women were rejected from getting help from PTSD all because they weren't men.
I had a conversation with my dad about the information I was learning from this book and he mentioned I should watch the movie "Born on the Fourth of July." That story was just as heart-breaking. I think these types of stories can be good conversation starters especially for Americans. It wasn't just the women who were being treated poorly when they got back from the war, soldiers were being spat on, yelled at and being treated like complete garbage when majority of them had no idea what was really happening during the war.
Here's a clip from Born on the Fourth of July the veteran in this is paralyzed from the hip down. (you don't have to watch the whole thing, you can stop at 1:11)
The Vietnam veteran experience was not something I realized I didn't know about. It was really interesting to have conversations and learn more about what really happened during this war.
The Women didn't only cover the Vietnam war, Frankie had a lot of life experiences throughout the entire book. However a lot of her problems stemmed from her experience during the war especially since so many people didn't believe that women were a part of it. Imagine helping soldiers survive, seeing so many gruesome injuries, surviving bombings, and then being told that there's no way you experienced that, I'd go mad.
I really enjoyed the pacing of the plot, the characters, the obstacles, and the grit shown in this story.
Here's a few quotes:
"In this crazy, chaotic, divided world that was run by men, you could count on the women."
"Women can be heroes."
"The women had a story to tell, even if the world wasn't quite yet ready to hear it, and their story began with three simple words. We were there.”