There Were No Flowers: A Surgeon’s Story of War, Family, and Love received a 4+ star review, making it an IndieReader Approved title.
Following find an interview with author William Meffert.
What is the name of the book and when was it published?
There Were No Flowers: A Surgeon’s Story of War, Family, and Love; published 9/27/22.
What’s the book’s first line?
I was just a young kid when we moved from Iowa to a military base in Colorado for Dad’s training.
What’s the book about? Give us the “pitch”.
A non fictional historical account of the damage and destruction caused by wars. The book takes the reader with the surgeon into the operating rooms of two major wars to see, up close, wounds and impairments of human casualties and to experience the difficult decisions these doctors are forced to make.
In wars, the winners and the losers, everyone, including soldiers’ families suffer. Everyone loses There Were No Flowers illustrates how doctors in combat survive by toughness, faith, family, and love.
What inspired you to write the book?
This book is composed from 80 years of letters to and from family members, many original photographs of family and of combat hospitals and surgeons, and strong memories about the difficulty of treating wounded people who suffer severe injuries when minimal preoperative information is available. Most of this would have otherwise been lost if not written down, and most of the insights from being involved in the destruction and the personal losses and sufferings, might have otherwise been forgotten.
I am not aware of another book that takes the readers into operating rooms with the surgeon, shows them the grevious injuries and shares the surgeons’ thoughts and choices involved as attempts are made to save the wounded. The doctors tell what they think about prayer and chance and, most of all, the loss of it all.