On Military Memoirs. A Quantitative Comparison of International Afghanistan War Autobiographies, 2001-2010

Abstract: In On Military Memoirs Esmeralda Kleinreesink offers insight into military books: its writers, publishers, the plots they write and their motives for writing. Every Afghanistan war autobiography published in the US, the UK, Germany, Canada and the Netherlands between 2001 and 2010 is compared quantitatively and qualitatively. On Military Memoirs shows that soldier-authors are a special breed. That self-published books still cater for different markets than traditionally published ones. That cultural difference are clearly visible between warrior nations and non-warrior nations. That not every contemporary memoir is a disillusionment story. And that writing is serious business for soldiers wanting to change the world. The book provides an innovative example of how to use interdisciplinary, mixed-method, cross-cultural research to analyse egodocuments.