What She Did for Love

By George Packer in The New York Times Weekend Edition

This first book by a Newsweek correspondent in Baghdad is really two books. One is a young war reporter’s memoir of the most horrific period of violence in Iraq, from 2005 to 2007, and of his discovery that he could live up to the extreme demands of his chosen profession. The other is an account of his up-and-down relationship with a lovely and idealistic young woman who followed him to Baghdad and whose life, along with the lives of three bodyguards, ended in a fusillade of bullets and grenades when her convoy was ambushed by Sunni extremists on Jan. 17, 2007.

One senses that the war story, conveying an experience that consumed Michael Hastings during a crucial period in his mid-20s, is the book he really wanted to write. It is better written, more vividly rendered, more intensely felt.

The love story is told with greater insistence and less conviction, without memorable passages or surprising recognitions. It accounts for the embarrassing title and the whiff of exploitation that hangs over “I Lost My Love in Baghdad.”

For Packer's full review go t o The New York Times