Jamie Dexter is “Army through and through.” Her dad is the Colonel, chief of staff at Fort Hood, Texas. Her older brother, TJ, has recently enlisted and is off to Vietnam. Jamie would go herself if she could. At twelve, she settles for working at the rec center on base, assisting Private Hollister, who’s in charge, with odd jobs when she isn’t engaging him in a spirited game of gin rummy. Jamie is fiercely proud of TJ and can’t imagine why the Colonel wanted him to wait until after college to enlist. Now she can’t wait to get his first letter. But when it comes, it’s written to her mom and dad and disappointingly spare. For Jamie, there is only a roll of exposed film with a request for her to develop it. Every subsequent letter from TJ has a roll of film for Jamie. She realizes that the pictures are his way of telling her about his life and the war in which he is serving, and that the photo of the moon he always includes bridges the distance between them. As Jamie’s skill in the darkroom grows, she is able to bring out greater detail and clarity in the prints, just as the photos themselves begin to reveal more of the tragedy that is war. At the same time, things in the rest of Jamie’s life grow increasingly unclear. Already puzzled by the Colonel’s lack of enthusiasm for TJ’s enlistment, she begins to wonder about the role her father plays in sending soldiers off to war, especially when Private Hollister announces he, too, may be headed for Vietnam. Frances O’Roark Dowell’s nuanced and finely told story features a cast of complex characters, at the center of which is a feisty, funny girl who finds so much of what she once knew to be true gradually shadowed by doubt. (Ages 10–14)

JAMIE THINKS HER FATHER CAN DO ANYTHING....

UNTIL THE ONE TIME HE CAN DO NOTHING.

When twelve-year-old Jamie Dexter's brother joins the Army and is sent to Vietnam, Jamie is plum thrilled. She can't wait to get letters from the front lines describing the excitement of real-life combat: the sound of helicopters, the smell of gunpowder, the exhilaration of being right in the thick of it. After all, they've both dreamed of following in the footsteps of their father, the Colonel.

But TJ's first letter isn't a letter at all. It's a roll of undeveloped film, the first of many. What Jamie sees when she develops TJ's photographs reveals a whole new side of the war. Slowly the shine begins to fade off of Army life - and the Colonel. How can someone she's worshipped her entire life be just as helpless to save her brother as she is?

From the author of the Edgar Award-winning Dovey Coe comes a novel, both timely and timeless, about the sacrifices we make for what we believe and the people we love.