Sunrise Over Fallujah

Sunrise Over Fallujah is a Young Adult novel by award-winning author Walter Dean Myers. The novel details the experiences of an eighteen-year-old man from Harlem, Robin “Birdy” Perry, who enlists in the U.S. Army and is stationed in Iraq during the early stages of the Iraq War in 2003. The narrative delves into Birdy’s reasoning behind joining, his experiences while serving, and his post-deployment views on his initial reasons for joining and his previous speculations about war.

Throughout the story, Birdy writes letters to his Uncle Richie who happened to serve in the Vietnam War when he was around Birdy’s age. As Birdy explains to Uncle Richie in the first of these letters, his reasoning behind joining the army was that, after experiencing 9/11 as a teenager, he felt completely helpless. Birdy wanted to do something useful to help his country and to feel that he was making a difference in people’s lives. And so Birdy joined the army against his father’s wishes and after training, finds himself stationed in Iraq. Birdy is assigned to the Civil Affairs unit, the unit responsible for interfacing with the civilian population and acting as mediators between the army and the Iraqi people.