The Fantasy Literature Track opened their Sunday programming in the Hyatt Embassy CD at 10AM with the panel “Military Veterans Who Write,” exploring the relationship between military service and writing. Rachel A. Brune, Jason Cordova, Darin Kennedy, Melissa Olthoff, and Robert W. Ross discussed the impact of military service on their work as authors.

The group represent decades worth of military service, with multiple deployments primarily in Iraq. Brune had the most direct connection between her military service and writing career because she served as a military journalist. It was the US Army that provided her first full time “professional” writing gig. With two deployments to Iraq, assigned to military police and logistics units respectively, it was the place where she learned how to write. She had to engage in the process of researching, interviewing, and writing daily and meet publication deadlines. It was a challenge that directly contributed to her development as a writer.

For most of the panelists, writing predates their military service. Kennedy, who describes himself as a “doctor by day and writer by night” served as a physician in Iraq. It was there that he wrote the first chapter of what became Pawn’s Gambit, the first volume in his three volume Pawn Strategem series. He developed the story idea in high school but never took the time to do anything with it until serving in a combat zone. During Operation Iraqi Freedom, Kennedy shared a room with a dentist who had a Panasonic Toughbook that he used to examine x-rays and send emails home. It was on that laptop computer that Kennedy used his off time to write the first chapter of his first book. At the time he had no idea that the story he had to tell would span three volumes, all he knew was that he had an opportunity and he took it.

Cordova’s writing is also rooted in his high school experience, but he became more intentional after serving in the military. A therapist recommended journaling as a therapeutic tool and went a step further, encouraging Cordova to journal through a fictional character. For Olthoff, writing while deployed was a way to fill the down time and give her something to do in between assignments.

For these authors their military experience provided a well of material that they can draw upon, when needed, to serve the story they are trying to tell. Olthoff, a pilot, described herself as “knowing just enough [about other elements of military service] to be dangerous.”  What she does have is a network of former colleagues and friends she can reach out to get the detail required for a plot point in a story. Brune also focused on the relationships built during her service. She intentionally moved away from military-based writing because it was too close to what she did for a living, she taps into the sentiment and emotion found in the relationships she made while in uniform.

On the impact combat zone experience had upon them, those panelists who were deployed focused on two realities: uncertainty and death. Deployment in a combat zone, whether your daily work takes you outside the wire or not, requires you to come to grips with uncertainty and dread. There is much that is unknown, and service members must come to grips with that. When the best intelligence you can get from the most advanced military in the world is “we think they’re over there,” dread becomes your constant companion. Beyond that, however, is the experience of loss. Brune recounted the tale of a helicopter crew she accompanied on a good will mission in northern Iraq. She covered it for her unit, getting the opportunity to meet and talk to the crew. She enjoyed not only what they did that day, which included providing local Iraqi children with candies and toys, but hearing the stories of the crew members themselves. She returned to base, wrote and submitted her story, and moved on to the next assignment. Two weeks later she got word the crew had been lost. Olthoff, speaking as much to Brune as the audience simply stated the obvious: Dealing with death is “never easy,” whether a comrade in arms or a beloved character. A fundamental truth of military service is that the young men and women who wear the uniform break the popular stereotype of the soldier, sailor, airmen, or marine. Each is unique. Brune taps into years of exploring the very humanity of service members when she’s writing.  In the final analysis, that’s what all these authors do. Their service in the military is part of who they are, and they use the experience and insight they gained through that service when and as they need it. It was a special hour.