The Road Home by Ellen Emerson White

I recently finished the Echo Company series by Ellen Emerson White (I believe they were originally published under her pen name Zack Emerson).  I bought them on impulse from a kindle deal I heard about through a blog I enjoy reading.  I started the first one on the journey to Peru and quickly read through 3 of them on the plane.  I finished the last 2 after I got home. Then I went and checked out some books about the Vietnam War from the library.

I love it when something I read makes me want to learn more about real life things. We study the Vietnam War in school from a historical and political perspective but these books seemed so real in the details that I want to know what it was like to be there because it sounds horrifying and terrible and so very sad for the men and women who went there.

Anyway, I really enjoyed the whole series. I loved Michael and his gang of friends from the first time they meet. Michael tried so hard not to let them in because they could be gone in an instant. And some of them were. Then Michael meets Rebecca.  These two both go through so much and from the moment they meet I was hoping for a happy ending for them.

The Road Home is my favorite book of the series. I’ve already bought myself a used paper copy. It goes on the keeper shelf and the second half of the book has already been re-read multiple times.  It’s about Rebecca coming home from the war and how she deals with trying to get on with her life when she can’t get over her recent past. I loved it. I won’t say it has a happy ending, but it has a perfect ending.  Perfect, and hard, and hopeful, which is why it is one of the best books I’ve read all year and one that I’ll revisit often in the future.