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Wounded Warriors: A Soldier's Story of Healing through Birds
Robert C. Vallieres struggled to find his “new normal” when he returned home after serving in the military. An accident in Kuwait left him suffering from traumatic brain injury (TBI) and internal injuries, leaving him in constant pain.
After clinics, bottles of painkillers, and behavior modification pills, hope seemed to vanish. Then a local weekly newspaper ad caught his a bird-watching trip to see raptors in the mountains of New Hampshire. An Emily Dickinson poem that states, “Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul, and sings the tune—without the words, and never stops at all,” sprang to his mind.
Wounded Warriors is Vallieres’s story of self-healing from crippling “invisible” wounds through the help of birds. The problems of TBI and post-traumatic stress disorder do not have definitive solutions. His story of recovery offers a winged hope to thousands of military personnel who suffer these physical and mental battles.
232 pages, Hardcover
First published February 1, 2014
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
April 2, 2026
Bob and I played rugby with the legendary ORCAS in Hawaii in 1986. We lost touch after I was sent to Colorado, though, and this was a welcome update.
Reading much like Vonnegut's "Slaughterhouse Five," "Wounded Warriors" takes us invariably through two decades-plus in a flashback/jump-forward/in-the-present style that is at once confusing and again intriguing. His poetry may not be enjoyed by some (nearly all nineteen pages of Chapter 27), and his bird-watching logs may seem mundane, but the story never loses its vigor and fascination.
Bob's pain, humility, frustration, and triumphs will be familiar to most veterans, and I would hope many others will gain some insight. The triumph is his discovery of something greater than he, and his embracing of that something. Eventually tying up the loose ends on the latter pages I found the story inspiring.
I'm glad I read this book. Nice work, Bob.
Reading much like Vonnegut's "Slaughterhouse Five," "Wounded Warriors" takes us invariably through two decades-plus in a flashback/jump-forward/in-the-present style that is at once confusing and again intriguing. His poetry may not be enjoyed by some (nearly all nineteen pages of Chapter 27), and his bird-watching logs may seem mundane, but the story never loses its vigor and fascination.
Bob's pain, humility, frustration, and triumphs will be familiar to most veterans, and I would hope many others will gain some insight. The triumph is his discovery of something greater than he, and his embracing of that something. Eventually tying up the loose ends on the latter pages I found the story inspiring.
I'm glad I read this book. Nice work, Bob.
Displaying 1 of 1 review