I just finished “Jarhead”, which is on at the cinema at the moment. Interesting book, though it does make you somewhat uncomfortable to be made aware that the men fighting out there – in this case not even fighting, since the author returned from the war never having made a kill – are, in some cases, teetering at the edge of their sanity. People safe at home in their beds prefer not to know this. They don’t like to know too much about what’s going on, in the same way that we probably all know abuse of prisoners happens on both sides – Iraqi and coalition – but we prefer not to have it brought to our attention, as we did when the “American abuse” photos hit the papers.

It’s not the kind of book I would usually read, but nevertheless I am glad I did.