Skip to main content

Brian Van Reet

Biography

Brian Van Reet

Brian Van Reet was born in Houston. Following the September 11th attacks, he left the University of Virginia, where he was an Echols Scholar, and enlisted in the U.S. Army as a tank crewman. He served in Iraq under stop-loss orders, achieved the rank of sergeant, and was awarded a Bronze Star for valor. He has twice won the Texas Institute of Letters short story award. SPOILS is his first novel.

Brian Van Reet

Books by Brian Van Reet

Spoils
by Brian Van Reet - Fiction

It is April 2003. American forces have taken Baghdad and are now charged with winning hearts and minds. But this vital tipping point is barely recognized for what it is, as a series of miscalculations and blunders fuels an already-smoldering insurgency intent on making Iraq the next graveyard of empires. Author Brian Van Reet explores the lives on both sides of the battle lines: Cassandra, a 19-year-old gunner who is captured during a deadly firefight and awakens in a prison cell; Abu al-Hool, a lifelong mujahedeen beset by a simmering crisis of conscience as he struggles against enemies from without and within; and Specialist Sleed, a tank crewman who goes along with a "victimless" crime, the consequences of which are more awful than any he could have imagined.