DOUG

ANDERSON

Doug Anderson is an American poet, fiction writer, memoirist and photographer. His most recent book of poems is Horse Medicine

Honors and Awards: Pushcart Prize, NEA (National Endowment for the Arts) GRANT,  The Kate Tufts Discovery Award and the Poets & Writers Exchange an award from the Virginia Quarterly Review, the Aetna Award for Nonfiction and Massachusetts Cultural Council Fellowship.

DOUG ANDERSON'S BOOKS

“Starred Review. In his first book of nonfiction, Anderson tells his story in inviting, poetic prose. He begins with his dysfunctional childhood in Memphis, then offers an evocative depiction of his service in Vietnam, which included a firefight on his first day in the field and more than his share of closely observed horror. He shows the hell of war as he went through it. Only in recent years did Anderson stop drinking, find meaningful work as a poet and teacher, marry and make a life-changing trip back to Vietnam in 2000. Yet what Anderson dubs “Snakebrain” (the demons inside him) remains a part of him. His beautifully told story is one of redemption, but also one without a happy ending.” - Publishers Weekly

“Moving and sharply observed . . . Anderson draws a line from his hardscrabble childhood and adolescence to a harrowing tour of duty as a Marine Corps medic in Vietnam to the collateral damage of both and a hard-won recovery over a 40-year span. Read it, weep, and understand. This book has my highest recommendation.”

—Wally Lamb, author of The Hour I First Believed

Reviews

“Doug Anderson’s memoir is both a personal account and a historical document—a snapshot of America in turmoil, a journey through the Vietnam War and its aftermath, a portrait of a mind struggling to cope with addiction and post-traumatic stress disorder. Intimate, unflinching, and timely, it reminds us how ruinous a war—any war, but especially an unjust war—can be for a society and for a human soul.”

—Ellen Litman, author of The Last Chicken in America

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“If indeed the past is prologue, then Doug Anderson has written a prologue for our times . . . His poet’s eye and ear make this recollection of his experience all the more vivid and haunting. Yet, it is the startling clarity of Anderson’s moral vision—his hard-earned wisdom—that should make this book required reading for anyone who wants to know what we should do next, and what we should never do again.”

—Martín Espada, author of Crucifixion in the Plaza de Armas