I asked my brother to get me the book Jarhead, by Anthony Swofford. It's the story of an aimless teenager who joined the marines for kicks only to find himself shipped to the Gulf in 1990-91 to fight in the war to liberate Kuwait. So I now have a nice hard-back version to keep me entertained over the next few weeks, though I doubt it'll actually be "entertaining" in that sense. Harrowing is more likely..