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A young man, eighteen, from a small Pennsylvania town, leaves New York Harbor and heads into harm’s way during World War II. He travels off to Cuba, Panama, San Diego, and then off to the South Pacific where he and his shipmates are continuously dodging death. He gets thrust into invasions in Leyte, Lingayen, and Okinawa. He experiences the worst and yet is fortunate to survive. He goes home after the war, a bit battered but alive, to build a life for himself and his pen-pal sweetheart. He gets married, finds work, purchases a home, has children, and lives a comfortable life with its standard ups and downs. A God-loving man, he makes the choice to follow a calling. Decades pass, and he retires to live out the rest of his days with his family. He stays married, up to his wife’s passing, for close to seventy years; and, as he still lives his life at the age of ninety-one, he decides to re-live his story again.
This book is about the American dream, about what we all aspire to. Obviously, we do not want to experience war; but for those who lived and died during World War Two, that was the reality, and to survive was the ideal. Remaley, one of our American heroes, presents this to his readers using limpid prose and his God-given ability to be a masterful storyteller. The work takes us on his and his wife’s journey, and we are compelled every step of the way, even when he speaks of what would be considered routine. The book is a moving tribute to his wife and a brilliant testament to one man’s ability to appreciate the life he was given.
RECOMMENDED by the US Review