Rating: 
Summary: Fiction dressed as fact
Review: Jessica Lynch is desperate to cash in on her ten minutes of fame. So, now she's claiming she was raped - although she has no memory of it - and in spite doctor's reports that say there were no signs of sexual assault. I'm just waiting for her next book, "I Was Abducted By Aliens, Too".
Rating:
Summary: the press machine does it again
Review: I have to tread lightly on the following statements I feel need to be made.....yet at the same time want to express exactly the purpose behind this book...
First off, as Jessica said , not only in her book, but also in her made for TV movie, she is not a hero.
If you check the tactical information sent to the rear elements during the day that the unit was ambushed, you might be surprised to know they actually were lost. Getting lost then having to be saved does not constitute the need to put well train troops into harms way.
Did any of the men who rescued Jessica get to end their military contracts, and then again would they? Would a "real soldier" forsake the country that they loved and take an early seperation ...clearly knowing that monies would be flowing in from the folks that are looking for a story to read as they hug their spouses and lite their fall fires...to both warm their homes but in buying the book, warm their hearts. Was this story released and delivered telling exactly what the real heros did?
No, if in fact it was, jessica would be but a side bar. The story of the troop who help back and destroyed the enemy that was trying to kill not only him but jessica also would be higher on the hero scale. The troops who woke in the dark of night, wrote their last letter to their wives and children and boarded a plane to go save jessica...those stories would be the ones that should have been mass marketed. Not a simple story of a troop who joined the service hoping to use the GI bill in the future; to eventually become lost in a vast desert to be saved by men who are still answering the call as you read this.
As far as those who gave their lives in the past . The men and woman who died in each war where the most glorious medal they ever were award was the Purple Heart. Does she real...and I guess all heads responsible from the Pentagon down to her CO must be asked...deserve the 'star? Was that in keeping of the highest military traditions? And if it was, we better mass produce them, and get one out to each member of the armed forces who ever took a step onto a battlefield.
But it's not her fault. In her hometown, sure, she's a hero. For the middle-aged couple serching for something to shed a tear about as they play along with a nightly gameshow, it's good for them too. But for the press and media of this fine country to search out and promote the actions to better the view of the war and the actions we were taking against a hostile and agressive coutry, well, again they made a mistake.
The same group that made a terrible mistake in the sixties and seventies by giving a cold shoulder to the proud military return from their work and duties in the drudgery and hell of vietnam are still trying to heal the wounds they inflicted during those years by promoting the sillyest of actions, and in doing so are only throwing more salt into the cuts they imposed long ago.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Book
Review: To be able to live being a POW, is just incredible. Jessica Lynch is a true soldier. She is not just a soldier, she is a fighter and she has faith. This book goes into detail about Jessica Lynch and her incredible story being a POW. I give this book 5 stars because it is impelling, it is just one book you cant miss. Very sad story.
Rating:
Summary: AWESOME ; US Soldier= Hero!!
Review: I LOVED this book, I have followed all her information since she was MIA, and I think it is awesome that she lived to tell the story! I think any person who enlists to serve our country is a HERO! As she says in her book, she doesnt think she is a Hero, she says everyone who helped save and care for her and rescued her are the real Heroes. God Bless her and her family. God Bless and watch over the ones still serving and bring them home. God Bless America!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Rating: 
Summary: Kind of weak
Review: This was a kind of weak read. Bragg's sentences were so choppy they gave me a headache trying to read it. I think he was in too much of a hurry. I heard Homer Hickam was the other author Jessica considered. She maybe should have gone with him. He knows West Virginia and has a great writing style.
Rating:
Summary: A Survivior... Courageous... Determined... God Blees You.
Review: PFC. Jessica Lynch is a Survivor against all odds. This book in my opinnion is very well written and informative but not too revealing of her personal life.
I prayed the day she went missing and stayed glued to CNN. I cried the day she was rescued and thanked God for watching over her. She was only trying to make money to put herself through college and she was dealt the unthinkable for it. My heart and prayers go out to her everyday. I want only to wish her happiness, love, good health and recovery. She will never be what she was But she will make every effort to be that again some day. And I can only wish her comfort in knowing I & alot of the world will be cheering her on in our corners of the world.
God Bless you Jessica!
Rating: 
Summary: No one could tell this tale better than Rick Bragg.
Review: Perhaps Jessica Lynch is a heroine, or perhaps she is--as she says--simply a survivor. Undoubtedly though, Miss Lynch is an ordinary young woman from West Virginia who underwent an extraordinary experience, not only in Iraq, but in the media glare that followed her capture and subsequent rescue. No writer is better suited to tell her tale than America's finest chronicler of ordinary people, Rick Bragg. If you enjoyed Bragg's previous books about his family members--Southerners who are the kinds of folk who don't usually get best-selling books written about them--you'll like this one too, regardless of your stance on the war in Iraq. Long after the spotlight fades from Miss Lynch and she resumes some semblace of a normal life, this book will still be read because Rick Bragg is such a fine writer. If you're avoiding this book because it's been hyped so much, you're probably pretty smart. Rick Bragg's understanding of the South and Southerners and his engaging style makes this well worth your time though.
Rating:
Summary: You should be so brave
Review: I think that everyone that has said something bad about Jessica Lynch should have gone and took her place fighting in the war. Her rescurers were brave also, but she is the one who watched her friends die in front of her and had to suffer all she did. I think that it's terrible that people are speaking of her badly.
Rating:
Summary: All Over But The Healing
Review: Rick Bragg says that he often writes about people who step in front of a moving train. That analogy certainly works for his just released book about Jessica Lynch. I can think of no writer more qualified to tell Jessica's story than Bragg. He is a first class journalist, having won the Pulitzer, and comes from a region of the country, rural Alabama, not unlike the West Virginia where Lynch grew up. (Since I grew up in rural East Tennessee, I'll take the temerity to make that judgment.) Although Bragg had to have written this book quickly, it does not suffer from haste or sloppy writing. Bragg doesn't waste words-- and while I miss his humor, I understand that what he is about here is serious business. His account of the ambush of the now famous ill-fated convoy from the 507th Maintenance Company captures the immediacy and horror of battle. It's as good writing about the awfulness of war as you'll read. The narrative is slim. That's as it should be. The event in Lynch's life that the world wants to know about is her capture and what happened to her while she was a POW. There is little of that information available and we may know now most of what we'll ever know. Bragg also discusses Lynch's growing up in West Virginia as well as her immediate and extended families. Her appeal is obvious: she is hardly more than a teenager, blonde, green-eyed, fragile and, from everything Bragg says, honest. She is our daugher, sister, cousin, and rightly or wrongly, hers is the face the public most associates with the American soldier in Iraq. Jessica Lynch does not consider herself a hero. (I'm reminded that Senator John McCain, another famous American POW, said that there was nothing heroic about getting captured by the enemy.) Bragg discusses the initial sainthood bestowed on her by the government and media and the later disillusionment in some circles because she didn't immediately disown the hype and inaccurate information that was fed to the hungry public. They expect this from a twenty year old who has had many of her bones broken and crushed, was suffering from malnutrition (it is the consensus of everybody involved that she would have died shortly if she had not been rescued by U. S. forces) and in her own words "cannot go to the bathroom." As one of her neighbors said, "She was courageous to do what she done in the first place. . . I couldn't have done it. . . How was she going to set the record straight from days of surgery and fleeting consciousness?" If she is not a hero-- does it matter-- she comes across as a decent, brave young woman. Her best friend was Lori, a Native American, whom Bragg pays tribute to, along with Lynch's other comrades who died in that awful massacre. The Lynch family, along with the Palestine community, are decent, salt-of-the-earth types as well. I bet I could identify most of those dishes the women brought in as the family awaited news of their "baby."
Lots of potato salad and banana pudding. It was heartening to read that Mr. Lynch, Jessica's dad, said that you cannot hate a whole country, particularly since Iraqi doctors apparently gave their own blood to help keep Jessica alive and an Iraqi civilian--Mohammed Odeh-al-Rehaief risked his own life to save hers. Whatever your feelings are about the rightness and wrongness of the U. S.'s invasion of Iraq, you have to feel empathy for this young woman. Her words "I am an American soldier too" have the ring of poetry and will be long remembered after she has had a chance to get on with her life.
Rating:
Summary: Not a HERO
Review: Females in war zones had better be ready to fight in the 21st century. There are no rules of war when engaged with an enemy. If you are a soldier in uniform and armed outside of the USA, be prepared. The government and the media propoganda put this young woman / soldier in the poor position to be held out as a war hero. Jessica was not and is not a hero. She served her country just as she volunteered to do. For that she has my respect. As for her skill as a soldier/warrior I think she is lacking in that position. This story brings to point the following questions:
1.women in the combat services and the skill or ability to perform said task.
2.The publication and dissemination of misinformation by the U.S. goverment.
3.The justification for the invasion into Iraq. All of these questions remain unanswered. So, I found no enlightening value from this book. It may be a welcomed read to those who are interested in the personal life of Ms. Lynch. I wish her well. Further, I wish ALL the other soldiers who will not make money $$$ (book sales)from their service to their country the very best. God bless the deceased soldiers, I hope their death was for a greater good.
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