Ryan smithson biography

About the author Ryan Smithson.
Ryan Smithson is special.
Ryan Smithson joined the Army Reserve and was deployed to Iraq as an engineer at the age of nineteen.

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Ghosts of War: The True Story of a 19-Year-Old GI, by Ryan Smithson

Not often does a book leave me speechless, but the difficult subject and beautiful writing in "Ghosts of War" did. Ryan Smithson was 19 when he was deployed to Iraq as a member of the Army Reserves. He tells the story of his platoon and so many like it overseas, the ones who are working to rebuild the country and make it safe for other troops and citizens, the ones who interact with villagers and the poorer people of Iraq. show more Not the ones who are busting down doors, searching for weapons caches or other types of activities that make the news. Smithson and his fellow soldiers are the unsung heroes of the war.

Smithson writes a moving memoir, that starts with his reaction to September 11, 2001, and his decision to join the Army Reserves, to his year long deployment overseas. The book ends with his return home and the difficulty in adjusting to life again, after living in a combat zone, and how he used writing as therapy for PTSD. The

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Ryan Smithson served with the Army Corps of Engineers from 2004–2005 in Iraq where he conducted road repair, base fortifications, and various earth-moving operations. When he came home, he went to college on the GI Bill and began writing about his war experiences. With the encouragement of a professor, he kept writing and eventually published his memoir, "Ghosts of War: The True Story of a 19-Year-Old GI" (HarperCollins, 2009). Please contact him @AuthorSmithson on social media or at Patreon.com/AuthorSmithson if you would like a signed copy of either "Ghosts of War" or "10 Klicks South of Whiskey." He has had several short stories and poems published in various journals and anthologies, and enjoys visiting schools to talk with young people about writing, war, and life. He wrote a play, "10 Klicks South of Whiskey" for his Master's thesis, and he was lucky enough to see it produced at Averill Park High School in 2015. Proceeds benefited a local not-for-profit veterans' organization called Soldier's Heart. The novel version of

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Ryan Smithson

Ryan Smithson is special. As a teenager who enlisted in the Army after witnessing the events of Sept. 11, 2001, he showed courage at an early age. After serving his country in Iraq he came home inwardly troubled. To ease his emotional turmoil, he wrote. Publishing his story as a book, "Ghosts of War," taught him the power of taking what he knew about himself to create the future that he wanted. The book also connected him to his passions for history and writing.

Ryan's story overlaps with the story of Nicholas Pekearo, who was an auxiliary police officer who was killed on duty in 2007. Nicholas was a prolific writer who was earning a degree at SUNY Empire State College before he died. Nicholas' mentor at the college’s Metropolitan Center, Shirley Ariker, told The New York Times at the time of Nick's death that, "He wrote stories about people struggling to do the right thing."

Ryan applied for the Nicholas Pekearo Endowed Scholarship in Creative Writing, and among numerous competitive applications his was selected. Ryan credits the scholarship with keeping him mo