“In Pumpkinflowers: A Soldier’s Story Mr. Friedman has written a top-notch account of this under-analyzed war, persuasively arguing that it heralded a new style of combat in the Middle East, though no one knew it at the time.” —Jennifer Senior, The New York Times

“This superb book is partly a history of the war, partly a personal memoir, and partly a work of political analysis. But mainly it is an effort to tell the story of the young men who fought to defend something “the size of a basketball court”—not all of whom survived. Pumpkinflowers is rich enough to allow different readers to draw their own political conclusions, if they choose to draw them at all. Above all, it is a book about young men transformed by war, written by a veteran whose dazzling literary gifts gripped my attention from the first page to the last.” —Bret Stephens, The Wall Street Journal

“Sober and striking…on par with Tim O’Brien’s “The Things They Carried” – its Israeli analog.” —The New York Times Book Review
 
“…phenomenal…extremely moving…” —Bari Weiss, The Wall Street Journal

“…compelling…”
—Parade.com

“Matti Friedman’s powerful memoir of his IDF service in Lebanon in the late-’90s foreshadows the complexities of 21st-century warfare.” —The New York Jewish Week

“Pumpkinflowers is a beautifully written, gut-wrenching book. … a poetic account of an Israeli army veteran's time in southern Lebanon.” —Shelf Awareness

“Friedman, a journalist and author of “The Aleppo Codex,” writes with great feeling and insight…. The author’s account of military life transcends the particulars of this tale.” —Christian Science Monitor

“Powerful account of youthful Israelis maturing, fighting, and dying at a forgotten Lebanon outpost. In this limber, deceptively sparse take on the Middle East's tightening spiral of violence, Friedman combines military history and personal experience on and off the line in deft, observant prose. The narrative is reminiscent of novels by Denis Johnson and Robert Stone, linking combat's violent absurdity to the traumatized perspectives of individual participants. A haunting yet wry tale of young people at war, cursed by political forces beyond their control, that can stand alongside the best narrative nonfiction coming out of Afghanistan and Iraq.” —Kirkus Reviews, starred review

“Remarkably educational and heartfelt: Friedman’s experiences provide a critical historical perspective on the changing climate of war in the Middle East, shifting from short official conflicts into longer unwinnable wars full of guerilla tactics and the deliberate creation of media narratives and images. His lyrical writing, attention to detail, and personal honesty draw the reader into empathy along with understanding. Friedman’s memoir deserves wide readership." —Publishers Weekly, starred review
 
“fast and engaging… A compelling war memoir containing elements of terror, observation, boredom, and grim (at times absurd) humor. This is an excellent read…” —Library Journal, starred review

“A compelling narrative, freighted with explosive geopolitical implications.” —Booklist, starred review
 

“A compelling narrative, freighted with explosive geopolitical implications.” —Booklist, starred review

When I went back to the Pumpkin in the fall of 2002 I thought it was a conclusion--an end to that war, and to the disquiet it left me and the others it touched. But I know now that I was wrong. It wasn’t a conclusion. On the hill in 1995 we had been at the start of something: of a new era in which conflict surges, shifts, or fades but doesn’t end, in which the most you can hope for is not peace, or the arrival of a better age, but only to remain safe as long as possible. None of us could have foreseen how the region would be seized by its own violence--the way Syria, a short drive from the outpost, would be devoured, and Iraq, and Libya, and Yemen, and much of the Islamic world around us. The outpost was the beginning. The present day might still be the beginning. The Pumpkin is gone, but nothing is over. —from Pumpkinflowers

“Poignant and fascinating. Matti Friedman tells a war story with a journalist’s rigor and eye for detail, and a poet’s touch. He manages to be lyrical, graceful, and deeply evocative even when tackling the harshest subjects imaginable.” —Lucette Lagnado, author of The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit

“Evocative, emotionally wrenching, and yet clear-eyed and dispassionate, Matti Friedman’s haunting war memoir reminds one of Michael Herr’s unforgettable Vietnam memoir, Dispatches.”—Kai Bird, author of The Good Spy

“A historical jigsaw puzzle and an examination of Israel’s fraught national identity. Friedman illuminates the confusion at the heart of the conflict and chillingly echoes America’s own slide into prolonged wars in the Middle East.” —Siobhan Fallon, author of You Know When the Men Are Gone

“Inspiring, heartbreaking, illuminating. Matti Friedman’s brilliant account of a forgotten war seen through the lens of a simple soldier is at once a coming-of-age story and an essential chronicle about how the twenty-first century was born.”—Yossi Klein Halevi, author of Like Dreamers