Critical Praise

"I know of no other new book that’s a better choice for any reading group that loves to debate literature and politics."

—Bob Minzesheimer, USA Today

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"Not since John Gardner’s On Moral Fiction has the intersection of literature and morality been so powerfully examined. In Soldier’s Heart the examination occurs in the conscience of a teacher whose students are en route to war. This is a thoughtful, moving, but also troubling book --- exactly as it should be."

—James Carroll, author of House of War and An American Requiem

"Like Azar Nafisi’s Reading Lolita in Tehran, Elizabeth D. Samet’s Soldier’s Heart is an illuminating look at the use of literature by a group of young people in an uncommon predicament. As a civilian professor at West Point, Samet has spent ten years teaching Shakespeare’s sonnets and Emerson’s essays to future warriors destined for the uncertain moral and physical terrain of Iraq. Her experience offers insight into the value of literature and the nature of soldiering, but most of all it offers a glimpse into the hidden mysteries of the human heart."

—Geraldine Brooks, author of March and Year of Wonders