Phil Klay

I always wrote - not about war, necessarily, but I always wrote stories. I tried to write while I was in Iraq. It's not really - I didn't do a very good job, and not about war.

I did try to write in Iraq, and I failed. I think you just don't have the brain space for it.

There's a wide spectrum between a Navy SEAL hero-killer and a traumatized victim, but those are the archetypes - hashed and rehashed in the media, in popular culture, in the minds of people with a lot of preconceived notions but not much else.

I'm not anti-war. I served in a war, and I served proudly. But just or not, necessary or not, war is the industrial-scale slaughter of other humans.

Certainly, when I'd left Iraq back in 2008, I'd been proud of my service, but whether we'd been successful or not was still an open question.

There's a tradition in war writing that the veteran goes over and sees the truth of war and comes back. And I'm skeptical of that.

I have friends with post-traumatic stress - friends with post-traumatic stress who are, you know, highly successful, capable people.

Less than 1 percent of American have served in 12 years of war, and serious public conversation about military policy is sorely lacking.

Political novels are full of pitfalls, particularly for a novelist with strong political leanings.

There's a tradition of public service in my family. I'm one of three boys that joined the military. My father was in the Peace Corps.

People have a very political way of looking at war, and that's understandable.

When I was in Marine training I memorised 'The Waste Land,' which was a significant experience in terms of really breaking apart language and thinking about how the different voices in that poem function.