• The Good Soldiers

  • By: David Finkel
  • Narrated by: Mark Boyett
  • Length: 10 hrs and 57 mins
  • 4.3 out of 5 stars (1,094 ratings)

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The Good Soldiers  By  cover art

The Good Soldiers

By: David Finkel
Narrated by: Mark Boyett
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Editorial reviews

During the troop surge in Iraq in 2007, Washington Post journalist David Finkel was embedded for eight months with Lt. Col. Ralph Kauzlarich - a determined, optimistic, inspired leader - and his unit: the 2-16 Second Battalion, 16th Infantry Regiment from Fort Riley, Kansas.

The 2-16 were deployed at the time in an area of intense insurgent activity in eastern Baghdad. Finkel writes, “From the beginning I explained to [the soldiers] that my intent was to document their corner of the war, without agenda. This book, then, is that corner, unshaded.” In fact, much of the book’s success stems from the open access granted to Finkel and the soldiers’ willingness to share their stories.

Finkel casts light on virtually all aspects of the 2-16’s “corner of the war”, including unflinching descriptions of deaths, and the profoundly destructive injuries inflicted by improvised explosive devices. Finkel’s descriptions are deeply moving and in many cases profoundly disturbing. But this is war, this is what the soldiers experienced, and Finkel aims to document the sacrifices these soldiers made that enabled the surge to succeed.

The Good Soldiers, besides being a valuable and unforgettable document, honors the men of the 2-16 Second Battalion. Written as a nonfiction novel, its prose style is simple and brilliantly effective.

Relatively new to audiobook narration, actor Mark Boyett has a strong, young voice whose articulation, pace, and clarity will resonate inside a car, a hall, or your head. He easily and naturally shifts his voice from the narrator’s point of view to the words of the many people chronicled in this book. A great range of emotions is expressed in The Good Soldiers, and Boyett adeptly inhabits these characters as he gives voice to the words they express. –David Chasey

Publisher's summary

It was the last-chance moment of the war. In January 2007, President George W. Bush announced a new strategy for Iraq. He called it "the surge". "Many listening tonight will ask why this effort will succeed when previous operations to secure Baghdad did not. Well, here are the differences," he told a skeptical nation.

Among those listening were the young, optimistic Army infantry soldiers of the 2-16, the battalion nicknamed the Rangers. About to head to a vicious area of Baghdad, they decided the difference would be them. Fifteen months later, the soldiers returned home forever changed.

Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post reporter David Finkel was with them in Bagdad almost every grueling step of the way. What was the true story of the surge? Was it really a success? Those are the questions he grapples with in his remarkable report from the front lines.

Combining the action of Mark Bowden's Black Hawk Down with the literary brio of Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried, The Good Soldiers is an unforgettable work of reportage. And in telling the story of these good soldiers, the heroes and the ruined, David Finkel has also produced an eternal tale - not just of the Iraq War, but of all wars, for all time.

©2009 Dave Finkel (P)2009 Audible, Inc.
  • Unabridged Audiobook
  • Categories: History

Critic reviews

  • 100 Notable Books of 2009 (The New York Times)
  • Best Books of 2009 (Publishers Weekly)
  • Best Nonfiction of 2009 (The Boston Globe)
  • Best Reads of 2009 (Slate.com)
  • Best Books of 2009: Nonfiction (Christian Science Monitor)
  • "Finkel's keen firsthand reportage, its grit and impact only heightened by the literary polish of his prose, gives us one of the best accounts yet of the American experience in Iraq." ( Publishers Weekly)
    "A superb account of the burdens soldiers bear." ( Kirkus Reviews)

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    What listeners say about The Good Soldiers

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    • Overall
      5 out of 5 stars

    Soldier's story almost without politics

    Powerful story of the soldiers with very limited politics. No completely blatant Bush bashing but there is a twinge of a liberal swing. But forget that because it is barely noticeable and the stories of the soldiers involved is very powerful.

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    2 people found this helpful

    • Overall
      1 out of 5 stars

    Poorly read, too repetitive

    The characters were great you got love our servicemen, but compared to a lot of other books being written about Iraq/Afgan it does not have the same smooth flow, too choppy for me. A journalist writing about war always has a bias and it seems to bleed through with this one. If your looking for a journalist on Iraq/Afgan war "Generation Kill" is much better.

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    2 people found this helpful

    • Overall
      5 out of 5 stars

    Great book on a tragic war

    An excellent book on America's twenty first century Vietnam. The reader is excellent as well. Every American needs to read/listen to this book so we can all understand just what we are asking of our young men when we put them in harm's way.

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    2 people found this helpful

    • Overall
      1 out of 5 stars

    Overpraised

    I had to quit reading it too, not only because of the repetition but because of the cliches. I mean cliches of war reporting, not cliches of language. Compared to such classics as "Dispatches," "Black Hawk Down," and "The Forever War," this book is nothing, a big yawn. I don't know why it's garnered such good reviews. I quit less than half-way through.

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    2 people found this helpful

    • Overall
      5 out of 5 stars
    • Performance
      4 out of 5 stars
    • Story
      5 out of 5 stars

    Compelling and brutal

    Hard-hitting and one of the best accounts of the infantry's experience during the Iraq War that I've read. Finkel appears to have gained a remarkable level of trust with the soldiers and officers of 2/16th Infantry, enabling him to convey much of the weight of what they were asked to endure and achieve during their deployment. Recommended for anyone wanting to have some insight into what we ask of our soldiers. Personally, I'd make this required reading for elected officials, military officers and senior DoD civilians. Mark Boyett's narration is solid and effective.

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    1 person found this helpful

    • Overall
      4 out of 5 stars
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      5 out of 5 stars
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      5 out of 5 stars

    Get them young!

    This is an excellent book and I urge you to think about what you are reading or hearing. Research- real research- tells us that the human brain does not mature until a person reaches their early 20s and for the people in the 2-16 the average age is 19 just like Vietnam.
    You can call them Men and Women but they are not- physically they are close enough but mentally it is not there yet so the Army wants to get the Infantry YOUNG - they will not know what is going to hit them.
    If you know Military Psychiatry you know that average Americans can take about 200 days of combat risk and then they begin to come apart psychologically though some will not even last that long and some will last much longer. Combat risk means days when you might have reasonably been at risk of cobat not simply when you were actually shot at or bombed, mortared, rocketed, etc. A 15 month deployment at Camp Rustamiyah will be 400 days of combat risk. To subject a soldier to 1000 days of combat risk riding up and down the same roads waiting to be blown to pieces means the Pentagon is just .... you fill out the rest.
    This book was written prior to 2009 and it is now 2018 and if you have not learned by now you just cannot learn and that is okay- its all good.

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    1 person found this helpful

    • Overall
      5 out of 5 stars
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      5 out of 5 stars
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      5 out of 5 stars

    Beautiful written, magnificently performed, tragic

    I bought this on a whim on Memorial Day. I am largely a pacifist and am a harsh critic of the US invasions of the Middle East since 2001. This account neither catered to my priors nor struck me as wrong-headed. It was an account, as pure as they come, and a beautifully written one at that.

    Also, the narrator is so good that I looked up other books he's narrated just to hear him some more.

    Be aware, there are graphic descriptions of violence and suffering within.

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    1 person found this helpful

    • Overall
      3 out of 5 stars
    • Performance
      4 out of 5 stars
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      3 out of 5 stars

    Good but not great

    I had read a lot of positive reviews about this book and that was the reason for my purchase. Unfortunately I was disappointed and left to wonder what those other reviewers heard in the book that I missed. I enjoy military related novels and I served in the military so there is a natural attraction to a well written story about war. But this book just did not hold my interest. Some times with a good book you just can't put it down and other times with a so so book you can't wait for the phone to ring, that is this book. At times I thought of just giving up and stop reading but I hung in there to the end, well almost the end.

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    1 person found this helpful

    • Overall
      4 out of 5 stars
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      5 out of 5 stars
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      4 out of 5 stars

    Riveting, Sobering, Important

    At times this book was tough to listen to, but it was never uninteresting. Written by a journalist who spent a year with an army unit based in some of Baghdad's toughest neighborhoods, this is a mostly first-hand account of the US "Surge" in the Iraq War. Because it is so personal, what we see of the Surge is not the "big picture" we're so used to seeing, but rather, we see the storm from its eye. It is a sobering view.

    Boyett's narration is great. Finkel is a very gifted writer, but he sometimes can't resist a clever turn of phrase or overly poetic language (not by any means poorly done, but somehow distracting here) which can occasionally be a disservice to his book.

    Of course, there is no book or work of art that can fully convey the horror and heroism of armed conflict, but "The Good Soldiers" does an excellent job. Finkel is unsentimental and unflinching, but still manages to convey a bit of his own humanity.

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    1 person found this helpful

    • Overall
      5 out of 5 stars
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      5 out of 5 stars
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      5 out of 5 stars

    Charlie Company 2/16 inf. 4th IBCT 06-10

    it was a true story told form the authors perspective and Colonel K's. I do wish it had more on the COPs and other smaller soldier level details. but that may just be me. overall a very good read.

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