Review: Most interesting and unusual
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 04 6, 2012
Second grade teacher Julia Miller motivates her pupils to send "Any Soldier" letters  to an unknown soldier stationed somewhere in Iraq. Staff Sergeant Robert Hickory receives the "Any Soldier" mail and takes the time to respond to these letters, sending more personalized letters to the young teacher. Gradually a vivid letter friendship develops between Julia and Robert, where photographs are exchanged and promises are made to meet personally at the first opportunity. However, all of a sudden Julia's letters remain unanswered and then they are returned. What happened to Staff Sergeant Hickorey? Is he alive?Julia was a difficult character: at one time she was very mature and thoughtful and in the next moment she could become very naive and childish. However, exactly these "negative" characteristics helped her to find Rob, so how could I not like her? Rob on the other hand was a bit more mature and knew better what he wanted from life. Basically he is an "anti-hero" but as of today he's got a special ranking on my very personal "list of heroes".The story line was remarkable and absolutely unconventional. This isn't your usual love story which is placed in front of a military background but it's actually a documentary that follows Sergeant Hickory through his ordeal after being injured in Iraq and what he has to go through until he's transported back to the States. The author describes in detail some of the brainless red tape procedures required and left me more than once with my head shaking. Obviously burocracy and sticklers for the letter of the law exist all over the world and of course in all the important domains of life. At the same time Julia (and later Claudia, Robert's sister) starts looking for Robert and through this thread Lubrican allows the reader a view into the same tragic army burocracy but from another angle, focusing on the civilian who tries to cope with the negative side effects of the army. Very well done! Informative and entertaining, very well written!The love story between Julia and Robert was also unusual.  Obviously Robert coped with his injury in a very positive way which didn't limit any of his physical actions and gave him the opportunity to pursue a "normal" live, which he actually did. There were many romantic and nice moments in Julia's and Robert's relationship and of course their "life together" was again "harassed" by army laws etc. There were many steamy sex scenes in this book, which were mostly well integrated into the plot, except for one or two, which didn't really support or enhance the story line or atmosphere. In my personal opinion these could have been left out and the space could have been used to elaborate on why Robert wasn't contacted by any of his "army buddies" during all of his recuperation or even afterwards. I guess that after ten years in service there would have been somebody he must have been close to.?A very unusual read that offered a lot of insights. I wouldn't have liked to miss this one out.