There are unique challenges faced by our Armed Forces that I have done my best
as a civilian to understand. And the results of years of research were not what
I would expect.
For whatever reason an individual joins the militaryโand the reasons are as
manifold as the number of individuals who serveโthose who make it a career begin
to form a commonality of why they continue.
From the outside I had thought that the bravery to enter battle must be among
the most difficult of steps. But it was not. Nor was that bravery subsumed by
โItโs an order, so the choice is out of our hands.โ The constant theme Iโve
heard as Iโve talked to soldiers or read their memoirs is that the task itself
is outside of โthem.โ The task comes from the command structure and, after a
sort of pro forma-required grumbling, is accepted as what must come next.
What sends the soldier, especially the career soldier, ahead into danger time
and time again is that is what the team is doing. โMark, Connie, and Tim are
going. Why would I think of staying behind?โ The military team supersedes
โfamily.โ It becomes far closer than family. Why? In how many domestic
households does your very life depend upon the absolute trust of the person
beside you from one minute to the next?
The hardest tasks are then: the loss of a comrade-in-arms, or leaving the
military entirely. In the former case, a death or significant injury of a
teammate is the ultimate failure. Had the team been somehow better than they
were, Mark would still be okay and serving beside them. And when they leave the
military, as Emily Beale and Mark Henderson did in my books, the change is
wrenching. One moment every meal, every day-to-day need is handled and you are
surrounded by a team that would rather take the bullet than have you hit, and
the next you are adrift in a world that has little definition, all tasks are
yours to do right down to paying the electric bill and buying groceries. Even
more exasperating, those beside you are untrained and undisciplined. More than
one soldier has said to me, โDo you see how civilians drive?!โ
It is for this reason that I break that code of no fraternization within the
military. For whom would they trust, whom would a career soldier love more than
the person who fights beside them. It is one of the joys of fiction that we may
explore the โWhat if?โ It has been my joy to think and write about that bond
that forms so deeply between people whose lives depend on each other and the
other bond that occurs between two hearts.
I often wonder if that is not the most difficult part of what a career soldier
does, is try to find some way to have love of comrades and love of family in
such constant conflict. For my heroes and heroines, I give them the gift of
circumventing that issue and being faced merely with the challenges of being
themselves.
About BRING ON THE DUSK
Five nations surround the Caspian Sea, five nations desperate for the vast
resources there, and willing to go to war. It will take all of Claudia and
Michael's ingenuity to avert disaster. As they discover how right they are for
each other, it will take even more to breach the walls they've so carefully
built around their hearts...
About M.L. Buchman
M. L.
Buchman has over 25 novels in print. His military romantic suspense books
have been named Barnes & Noble and NPR โTop 5 of the yearโ and Booklist โTop
10 of the Year.โ In addition to romance, he also writes contemporaries,
thrillers, and fantasy and science fiction.
In among his career as a corporate project manager he has: rebuilt and
single-handed a fifty-foot sailboat, both flown and jumped out of airplanes,
designed and built two houses, and bicycled solo around the world.
He is now a full-time writer, living on the Oregon Coast with his beloved wife.
He is constantly amazed at what you can do with a degree in Geophysics. You may
keep up with his writing at his official
website.
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