Defining Moments: True Story of War, Family Conflict & Reconciliation, A

 Author's Summary

"Defining Moments" is the compelling true life story of one American soldier's adventures in the South Pacific during World War II. It is is a captivating tale of war behind the front lines as revealed through the more than 300 letters this young G.I. from rural Ohio wrote to his family between the years 1940-45. This memoir, written by the soldier's eldest son, captures in vivid detail Bill Dustman's transformation from boyhood to manhood. The book presents in candid detail the "defining moments" which shaped this young man's life once he departed the bucolic, but cloistered environment of his rural hometown to experience an unfamiliar and uncaring world over which he had little control.

MWSA Review

A family story, inspired primarily from over 300 letters written by the author’s Dad while he served in WWII.  Author/son Robert Dustman ties in his Ohio family roots prior to dad’s enlistment in 1939, creates a narrative portraying dad’s service experience, and ties in the family difficulty’s and resolve after dad returns from the South Pacific in 1945.  Bill Dustman, the author’s father, primarily plays a horn in an Army band – but he’s not entirely shielded from the shelling and carnage.  The author well describes the close quarter’s service life and brings in odd but enduring relationships experienced overseas.  He adds practical jokes encountered and other, far worse reflections – like the Bataan death march.  Graphic war details are purposefully omitted, however.  This book would be for those who enjoy tracking family through the duration of life’s changes and conflict, with a specific WWII interest. 

Reviewed by: Wood, Hodge (2012)