The Patrol: Seven Days in the Life of a Canadian Soldier in Afghanistan

Ryan Flavelle

Feb 2013 · Sold by Harper Collins

About this ebook

In 2008, Ryan Flavelle, a reservist in the Canadian Army and a student at the University of Calgary, volunteered to serve in Afghanistan. For seven months, twenty-four-year-old Flavelle, a signaller attached to the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry, endured the extreme heat, the long hours and the occasional absurdity of life as a Canadian soldier in this new war so far from home. Flavelle spent much of his time at a Canadian Forward Operating Base (FOB), living among his fellow soldiers and occasionally going outside the wire. For one sevenday period, Flavelle went into Taliban country, always walking in the footsteps of the man ahead of him, meeting Afghans and watching behind every mud wall for a sign of an enemy combatant. The Patrol is a gritty, boots-on-the-ground memoir of a soldier’s experience in the Canadian Forces in the 21st century. It is about why we fight, why men and women choose such a dangerous and demanding job, and what their lives are like when they find themselves back in our ordinary world.

Ratings and reviews

Really appreciate the man's service, but this book is a bland, repetitive trudge to get through. 90% of the book is him complaining about carrying heavy stuff, 8% complaining about other stuff, & 2% action. The very limited action that is described, mostly happened without his direct involvement, & only gets a brief description before the complaints about carrying a heavy pack immediately resume. Carrying a heavy load on foot for days on end had to suck, & he's got my respect for it, but reading 200+ pages of complaining is just hard to get through.

I found the book boring as a story I'm sorry, but it was nice to see that the British infantry are very similar in some ways. There's a lack of action throughout bug it's a true story of one man's patrol

About the author

RYAN FLAVELLE joined the Canadian Forces reserves as a signaller in 2001, and in 2007 he volunteered to go to Afghanistan. On returning, he took on graduate studies at the Centre for Military and Strategic Studies at the University of Calgary. His research into battle exhaustion during the Second World War took first prize in the Journal of Military and Strategic Studies Awards for Excellence. Flavelle lives in Calgary with his family. Follow him on Twitter @RyanFlavelle and become a fan on Facebook.