The Citizen Soldier

The Citizen Soldier is a war story with a difference. Following a street fight, which results in his combatant's death, Portsmouth born and bred Davey Dwyer is given an ultimatum. Either enlist in the American 101st Airborne, or go to prison. He chose the latter. After only a few days military training at Greenham Common, his plane is shot down over the Normandy Coast on D-Day and he ends up landing thirty miles from his intended drop zone, two miles south of Omaha Beach. On landing, he his reunited with the now injured Major that recruited him, for his very own chilling reasons, and the only friend he had made whilst based at Greenham common. With every effort being made not to compromise the surprise of the invasion, Dwyer is left not only carrying the Major to safety, but also finds himself fighting an enemy within the US Army and his own voice of reason. The story then follows the exact timeline of the events that took place on Easy Red Sector with Dwyer and the Major hiding amongst the German positions witnessing the horrors below on the beach. Dwyer throughout makes a 'nuisance' of himself as far as the Germans are concerned and has further enemy contacts. Dwyer's initial euphoria of gaining retribution on the German enemy following the killing of his family in an earlier bombing raid, starts to turn into despair as a result of taking human lives and the horror he finds himself in the middle of. It makes him start to question his own actions and very sanity throughout his emotional roller-coaster. The question of why he was recruited by the Major in the first place, to get him into the mess, is also at the forefront of his mind.