Historical writing and fiction are not the same thing, though historians often creatively manipulate material in imposing plot structures, selecting starting and ending points, and fashioning compelling literary characters from historical figures. In Docu-Fictions of War, Tatiana Prorokova argues that the opposite is also true—war fiction offers a kind of history that both documents its subjects and provides a snapshot of the cultural representation of the United States’ most recent military involvements. She covers a largely neglected body of cinematic and literary texts about the First Gulf War, the Balkan War, the Afghanistan War, and the Iraq War to open a fresh analysis of cultural texts on war. Prorokova contends that these texts are not pure fiction, but “docu-fictions”—works of imagination that can document their subjects while disclosing the social, political, and historical link between war and culture during the last three decades. Docu-Fictions of War analyzes how these representational narratives have highlighted a humanitarian rationale behind American involvement in each war, whether the stated goals were to free the oppressed from tyranny, stop genocide, or rid the world of terrorism. The book explores the gap between history—what allegedly happened—and the cultural mythology that is both true and inexact, tangible and sensed, recognized and undocumented.

Contributions by Thomas J. Cobb, Donna A. Gessell, Helena Goscilo, Cyndy Hendershot, Christian Jimenez, David LaRocca, Lori Maguire, Tatiana Prorokova-Konrad, Ian Scott, Vesta Silva, Lucian Tion, Dan Ward, and Jon Wiebel In recent years, Hollywood cinema has forwarded a growing number of images of the Cold War and entertained a return to memories of conflicts between the USSR and the US, Russians and Americans, and communism and capitalism. Cold War II: Hollywood’s Renewed Obsession with Russia explores the reasons for this sudden reestablished interest in the Cold War. Essayists examine such films as Guy Ritchie’s The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Steven Spielberg’s Bridge of Spies, Ethan Coen and Joel Coen’s Hail, Caesar!, David Leitch’s Atomic Blonde, Guillermo del Toro’s The Shape of Water, Ryan Coogler’s Black Panther, and Francis Lawrence’s Red Sparrow, among others, as well as such television shows as Comrade Detective and The Americans. Contributors to this collection interrogate the revival of the Cold War movie genre from multiple angles and examine the issues of patriotism, national identity, otherness, gender, and corruption. They consider cinematic aesthetics and the ethics of these representations. They reveal how Cold War imagery shapes audiences’ understanding of the period in general and of the relationship between the US and Russia in particular. The authors complicate traditional definitions of the Cold War film and invite readers to discover a new phase in the Cold War movie genre: Cold War II.

An eclectic, multidisciplinary collection that explores the representation of war and its aftereffects in children's books and documentary film. Brings together internationally known contributors to examine the ongoing influence of violence and war on children's literature by studying the childhood experiences of authors writing for children, the children represented in war stories, and the experiences of children who make up the stories readership. From publisher description.

From the author of Welcome to Camp America, an eerie exploration of America's performance of power and identity in the post-9/11 era What are the stories we tell ourselves, the games we play, to manage unsettling realities? Made on ten military bases across the United States since 2016, Necessary Fictionsdocuments mock-village landscapes in the fictional country of "Atropia" and its denizens, roleplayers who enact versions of their past or future selves in realistic training scenarios. Costumed Afghan and Iraqi civilians, many of whom have fled war, now recreate it in the service of the US military. Real soldiers pose in front of camouflage backdrops, dressed by Hollywood makeup artists in "moulage"--fake wounds--as they prepare to deploy. Brooklyn-based conceptual documentary artist and former civil rights lawyer Debi Cornwall (born 1973) photographs this meta-reality--the artifice of war--presented in the book with a variety of texts to provoke critical inquiry about America's fantasy industrial complex. The book includes an essay by PEN Award-winning critical theorist Sarah Sentilles.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A second American Civil War, a devastating plague, and one family caught deep in the middle—this gripping debut novel asks what might happen if America were to turn its most devastating policies and deadly weapons upon itself. From the author of What Strange Paradise "Powerful ... as haunting a postapocalyptic universe as Cormac McCarthy [created] in The Road." —The New York Times Sarat Chestnut, born in Louisiana, is only six when the Second American Civil War breaks out in 2074. But even she knows that oil is outlawed, that Louisiana is half underwater, and that unmanned drones fill the sky. When her father is killed and her family is forced into Camp Patience for displaced persons, she begins to grow up shaped by her particular time and place. But not everyone at Camp Patience is who they claim to be. Eventually Sarat is befriended by a mysterious functionary, under whose influence she is turned into a deadly instrument of war. The decisions that she makes will have tremendous consequences not just for Sarat but for her family and her country, rippling through generations of strangers and kin alike.

December 1937. The Japanese have taken Nanking. A group of terrified schoolgirls hides in the compound of an American church. Among them is Shujuan, through whose thirteen-year-old eyes we witness the shocking events that follow. Run by Father Engelmann, an American priest who has been in China for many years, the church is supposedly neutral ground in the war between China and Japan. But it becomes clear the Japanese are not obeying international rules of engagement. As they pour through the streets of Nanking, raping and pillaging the civilian population, the girls are in increasing danger. And their safety is further compromised when prostitutes from the nearby brothel climb over the wall into the compound seeking refuge. Short, powerful, vivid, this beautiful novel transports the reader to 1930s China. Full of wonderful characters, from the austere priest to the irreverent prostitutes, it is a story about how war upsets all prejudices and how love can flourish amidst death.

“A well-written and worthy sequel to one of SF’s enduring classics”—the Nebula Award winner The Forever War—now with a bonus story, “A Separate War” (Publishers Weekly). On virtually every list of the greatest military science fiction adventures ever written, Joe Haldeman’s Hugo and Nebula Award–winning classic, The Forever War, is ranked at the very top. In Forever Free, the Science Fiction Writers of America Grand Master and author of the acclaimed Worlds series returns to that same volatile universe where human space marines once engaged the alien Taurans in never-ending battle. While loyal soldier William Mandella was fighting for the survival of the human race in a distant galaxy, thousands of years were passing on his home planet, Earth. Then, with the end of the hostilities came the shocking realization that humanity had evolved into something he did not recognize. Offered the choice of retaining his individuality or becoming part of the genetically modified shared Human hive-mind, Mandella chose exile, joining other veterans of the Forever War seeking a new life on a wasteland world they called Middle Finger. Making a home for themselves in this half-frozen hell, Mandella and his life partner, Marygay, have survived into middle age, raising a son and a daughter in the process. Now, the dark truth about the colonists’ ultimate role in the continuation of the Human group mind will force Mandella and Marygay to take desperate action as they hijack an interstellar vessel and set off on a frantic escape across space and time. But what awaits them upon their return is a mystery far beyond all human—or Human—comprehension . . . In Forever Free, Joe Haldeman’s stunning vision of humankind’s far future reaches its enthralling conclusion in a masterwork of speculation from the mind and heart of one of the undisputed champions of hard science fiction. And in the bonus story included in this volume, “A Separate War,” Marygay, reassigned and separated from her lover, Mandella, continues fighting in military engagements across the stars—all the while planning how she and Mandella can reunite despite the time and space between them.