Part history lesson, part political statement, part biography. Krakauer uses Pat Tillman's life as a way to look at the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, starting his history of the area at about the time Pat was born. He then intersperses events from Tillman's life with what was going on half a world away. Once Tillman joins the military, the book stays mostly with him. After his death, Krakauer follows the family's attempts to discover what really happened to their loved one. 
 If you're a fan of George W. Bush, you probably won't care much for this book. I enjoyed the grounding of our current state of affairs in the quagmire of history. It depresses me that my country acts the way it does. You can blame it on Bush or Cheney, but we all must take our part of the blame, since we allow these things to happen either through our ignorance or apathy.