Novelist Explores the True Cost of War on Society
Iraq War veteran Kevin Powers's new novel explores how the Great War and the 1918 flu pandemic reshape three young Virginians entangled by love, rejection, and survival on the Western Front.
Roy Young, a Vanderbilt University student with his future neatly planned, expects to modernize his family’s farm in Ewer’s Rock, Virginia, and marry Samantha Hatton, the local minister’s daughter and his childhood companion. But when he returns home during the winter break of World War I, Sam delivers a harsh rejection that forces him to reconsider his assumptions. By the summer of 1917, Roy abandons his agricultural ambitions entirely and enlists to fight in France.
According to Malcolm Forbes writing in Washington Examiner, Powers’s latest work, Children of the Wild, follows not just Roy but three interconnected lives reshaped by war, love, and survival.
The narrative opens in peacetime Virginia, where Powers depicts Roy as an overconfident young man who takes Sam for granted, believing he loves her when in reality he simply appreciates how easily she fits into his life plans. Sam’s rejection humbles him, asserting her independence and agency.
The Orphan in the Wild
The story shifts to Sam as she ventures into the highlands and encounters a nameless orphan living alone in the wilderness. The young man has no memory of family or identity. Sam discovers “Ennis Duke” inscribed on a label inside his coat, and the name becomes his own. A romance blossoms between them, and Ennis agrees to leave the mountains and integrate into the community of “flatlanders.”
Ennis proves himself capable, securing work as a hand on Roy’s father’s estate and demonstrating remarkable skill with firearms while guarding livestock. When Roy returns and discovers his childhood friend has been claimed by another, he challenges Ennis to a physical confrontation. The brutal fight paradoxically brings the two men together, as Roy recognizes in Ennis a fellow soul for whom violence comes naturally. The rivals become brothers in arms.
From Virginia to the Western Front
Roy’s decision to enlist and fight the Germans initially confuses Ennis, who sees no reason for enmity toward people he knows nothing about. Nevertheless, he too volunteers, leaving Sam bereft as both men depart for France. While Lieutenant Young and Private Duke face German attacks and navigate the hellscape of trench warfare, Sam confronts her own nightmare at home as the influenza epidemic ravages the community.
Powers, who earned acclaim for his 2012 debut The Yellow Birds based on his service as a machine-gunner in Iraq, demonstrates his signature mastery in depicting warfare. His 2018 novel A Shout in the Ruins captured the savagery of the Civil War. Throughout his work, he explores not merely battlefield action but the enduring psychological wounds that soldiers carry long after peace is declared.
From Innocence to Combat
In Children of the Wild, Powers chronicles the transformation from civilian to warrior with characteristic skill. Ennis’s military induction at Camp Lee begins poorly when he admits he cannot read and has no documented birthplace. Yet he excels at the firing range and becomes a renowned sharpshooter in France. Roy proves his mettle leading men into what he describes as a perfect little piece of hell.
The author delivers visceral portrayals of bombardments, close-quarters combat in trenches, desperate maneuvers across devastated terrain, fighting amid ruined towns, and perilous woodland engagements. His depiction of the Great War carries the authenticity of a veteran writer who understands how violence reshapes those who experience it, whether in the trenches of France or the battlefields of Iraq.
With information from Washington Examiner
