COUNT ON US

Women have served in every war this country has fought. From that first war on, while they cooked and cleaned and nursed, they also worked the guns, dug the trenches, and finessed the enemy. In this splendidly designed and lucid narrative, Nathan uses sidebars about individual women soldiers and medical personnel along with a rich array of photographs to personalize every conflict; chapters include the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, both World Wars, Vietnam, the Persian Gulf, and Afghanistan and Iraq. She does not flinch from the enormous obstacles put in the path of women who, for a variety of reasons, wanted to serve their country at war, nor from the prejudice and racism they encountered. She is plainspoken about the hardships and horrors, but also about how women worked, studied, learned, and did what needed to be done. Readers will also get a sense not only of how far women have come, but how far military science and medicine have progressed. Alert readers will also see clearly how far women have yet to go to achieve equality in and out of the service. (bibliography, index) (Nonfiction. 9-14)