New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, (2001). First edition - The fourth novel by this award-winning writer, the story of a woman in the Vietnam War. "'After my first book was published, I received some letters.' So begins Sigrid Nunez's haunting novel about the poignant and unusual friendship between a writer and a retired army nurse who seeks her out decades after their childhood in the same housing project. Among the letters the narrator receives is one from a Rouenna Zycinski, recalling their old connection and asking if they can meet.Though fascinated by the stories Rouenna tells about her life as a combat nurse in Vietnam, the narrator flatly declines her request that they collaborate on a memoir. It is only later, in the aftermath of Rouenna's shocking death, that the narrator is drawn to write about her friend - and her friend's war." 230 pp.