Now in a library-quality hardcover edition with a modern, legible presentation, this is a true contemporary account of an American nurse's horrific - and sometimes bizarre - experiences while serving at a French battlefield hospital near Soissons during World War I. It has poignant layers which even the oft-naive author did not see. As our camion drove through the chateau gate we could see that the grounds were covered with what looked like sleeping men. That is just her own introduction to the unit, housed in what was once a country estate, and soon she was standing hours on end treating friend and enemy alike, facing harrowing hyperreality with aplomb. Shirley Millard is throughout a willing reporter of her fascinating perspective on war, youth, loss, and love - and always slapdash surgery and gallows camaraderie, inside a MASH unit before there was MASH. And before antibiotics, it is painfully clear. But she is also an unwitting reporter of so much more. The modern reader sees truth