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Juiceboxers
A finalist for the Amazon Canada First Novel Award, a powerful debut novel about four young soldiers serving in Afghanistan, and the devastating aftermath of war.
Winner of the 2025 Robert Kroetsch City of Edmonton Book Prize
Finalist for the 2025 Amazon Canada First Novel Award
“An unvarnished, intimately informed dissection of war’s physical and emotional derangements.” – Omar El Akkad, author of What Strange Paradise and American War
Sixteen-year-old Plinko is attending basic training before high school starts up again in the fall. Feeling adrift from his own family, he moves in with an older soldier, where he forges an unlikely group of friends in the military: the very tall Walsh, who moves in shortly after Plinko does; Abdi, whose Somali immigrant parents often welcome the group of young men over for dinner; and the unpredictable and gun-loving Krug, who is brash and exasperating yet magnetic.
After 9/11, the military prepares to move into Afghanistan — to go to war. Plinko and his friends have no idea that the trajectory of their lives is about to be irrevocably altered.
Drawn from the author’s experiences as a soldier in Afghanistan, Juiceboxers tenderly traces the story of a young man’s journey from basic training, to the battlefields of Kandahar, to the inner city of Edmonton, braiding together questions of masculinity and militarism, friendship and white supremacy, loss and trauma and hard-won recovery.
Praise forJuiceboxers
Juiceboxersis an unvarnished intimately informed dissection of wars physical and emotional derangements So many moments in Benjamin Hertwigs dark but ultimately tender novel reminded me with eerie precision of things I had seen and heard while covering the invasion of Afghanistan the marrowdeep racism the casual bloodlust the desperate need to belong to something anything To read this book is to contend with what the enterprise of industrialscale violence can do to its most active participants the many ways in which one emerges from so bloody a thing dislocated from who they used to beOMAR EL AKKADauthor ofWhat Strange ParadiseandAmerican War
Juiceboxersis not a comingofage story it is a coming to grips story The reader is lulled through desert days and nights where time is absent but the bravado and bigotry of war isnt From the sandy hills and mountains of Afghanistan to the slushy streets of Edmonton Hertwigs poetic prose leaves us with a sense of hope Hertwigs words do not shy away from horror and healingNORMA DUNNINGauthor ofTainnaandAnnie Muktuk and Other Stories
Juiceboxersis a fiercely honest portrait of young soldiers fighting a war Canada would rather forget and then discovering that it has followed them home Benjamin Hertwigs debut novel is an unflinching act of remembrance a tale of brotherhood and prejudice and a moving portrait of lives and friendships forged and torn apartTHOMAS WHARTONauthor ofThe Book of RainandIcefields
Tempering harshness with tenderness and humour Benjamin HertwigsJuiceboxersmaps external and internal territories of conflict with sure grasp of character A gripping addition to the canon of the literature of war and what comes afterNABEN RUTHNUMauthor ofA Hero of Our Time
Praise for Benjamin Hertwig
In his quiet way Benjamin Hertwig shows us the terror and wonder of being alive a powerful exploration of violence longing and the before and after of time and war and other old gods profound and beautifulDEBORAH CAMPBELL
Hertwig touches on some of our deepest national myths only to push in breaking the veneer of patriotism to reveal something much more potentCV2
Hertwig remembers in lyrical detail moments of violence fear and respite He traces violence from the schoolyard to war and its aftermath for the soldier The consequences of the indiscriminate violence of war are made delicate in spite of an uneasiness with making poetry of itMONTREAL REVIEW OF BOOKS
Benjamin Hertwig served in the Canadian Armed Forces in Afghanistan and this hardhitting debut collection is the record of a soldiers heart before during and after warTORONTO STAR
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Details
Dimensions:
300 Pages
8.5in * 5.5in * .6in
460gr
Published:
September 17, 2024
Publisher:
ISBN:
9781990601712
Book Subjects:
Language:
eng
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