Local blogger and Virginia Quarterly Review web guy Waldo Jaquith interviews photojournalist Ashley Gilbertson, whose eye-opening recent article in the VQR “The Life and Lonely Death of Noah Pierce” “tells the story of just one veteran, the 23-year-old Pierce, who took a handgun and shot himself in the head on the night of July 25, 2008, tortured by the memories of what he’d seen and what he’d done in his two tours of duty in Iraq.”

Indeed, the peice is a wake-up call for anyone who has been lulled to sleep by this drawn out war. Writes Jaquith on the VQR’s blog, “I sat down with Ashley a few weeks ago to discuss how he became interested in this topic, why it’s so important, and what it’s been like for him to write about and photograph something so difficult.”

Listen to the interview

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