CALLED TO DUTY

SYNOPSIS

Over ten million men and women served their countries from 1914 to 1918 in the war to end all wars, World War I. English Tommies, French poilus, Germans, Canadians, American Doughboys. Today there are only thirty-two left around the world. And time is running out for them.

 A war hero herself, veteran of two tours of duty in Iraq, twenty-five year old Capt. Carthage Mulkern has been assigned to interview the handful of American survivors who can still recall their distant past. The U.S. president, concerned by the progress of his war and the demoralization of the American people, intends to use these last survivors to spin a patriotic message to those in doubt and to those still serving. Carthage must create a military propaganda piece that will connect the generations of soldiers, from the oldest veterans to the youngest still fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, in time for Veteran’s Day and the fall elections to help the president’s continuing military efforts.

Carthage is the perfect choice for the job. Raised by parents who are connected to the military and to the current administration, a graduate of West Point, who has written for the military’s Stars and Stripes, Carthage was wounded in combat and earned a medal of bravery for her actions. Descended from a long line of Southern bluebloods, with ancestors who fought in the American Revolution and the Civil War, she is young, idealistic, a career officer who is honored by her selection for this prestigious assignment. What nobody knows, not her commanding officer, not her own family, is that she is two months pregnant and that the man she loves is still serving in Iraq. PFC. John Monteiro was her high school sweetheart. She has not heard from him in several days. It is unlike him not to be in touch with her one way or another, and she is concerned that something terrible might have happened. In fact, something has happened, and the military, her own people, will not tell her the truth.

Unaware of the machinations of those people she most trusts, Carthage begins her interviews of three ancient veterans not knowing if her lover is dead or alive. Bill Duff lives in a nursing home in Portland, Maine. An Indiana farm boy, he served under Gen. Douglas MacArthur in the Meuse-Argonne salient. Alone in the world, he saw more than he ever cared to see in France and is now doing little more than awaiting his own death. Burleigh Hunt Bell, a southern poet, not only served his country in Europe but watched Orville Wright take flight and earned the hatred of the Ku Klux Klan when lynching was a popular pastime in Dixie. Harold Hahn fought for the German army in World War I. A Jew from a wealthy and influential Munich family, he stayed in German far longer than he should have.

CALLED TO DUTY is four powerful tales in one. It is a salute to the brave survivors of the Great War before they pass away. It is also a story of people who have been to war and who understand that the fight in the trenches is only the beginning. Carthage’s desperate hunt for the truth leads her down a road she never wanted or expected to travel. She must confront the truths in her own life with the support of three wonderful old men who has each been down the same road before. The war in the trenches can’t be won until the wars at home are won.