Operation: Homefront

Here's another book I've run across that might make a good read for younger teens. Caroline Cooney wrote Operation: Homefront  (Laurel-Leaf Books, 1992) soon after the 1991 Gulf War. I’m not familiar with her work but I have been told that her books are hilarious at the same time they touch on serious issues. This one is about the Herrick family, whose mom joins the National Guard to earn some extra money, never thinking she will be called up.  When the first Gulf War starts, her unit is sent to Saudi Arabia as part of Operation Desert Shield. 

Joining the National Guard was seen as a joke by her rather spoiled, middle class family, but deployment is no joke.  They go through all the emotions and stresses any military family would, After the mother leaves, the family worries as they compulsively watch the news,  and their family falls apart until they realize their well being rests on all their shoulders now. By the end of the book they have come together and grown to see their mother is a different light as someone who has a life apart from her children, and plays a larger part in theirs than they had realized. 

School Library Journal applauds Cooney for dealing well with the role of women in modern warfare and its impact  “This is a tightly written story that moves quickly, giving lots of information about the war, its background, and its outcome, as well as offering a family story of struggle and survival,” it says.