The Mercenary: A Story of Brotherhood and Terror in the Afghanistan War

by Jeffrey E Stern

Overview

A thrilling and emotional story about the bonds forged in war and good intentions gone wrong.

In the early days of the Afghanistan war, Jeff Stern was scouring the streets of Kabul for a big story. He was accompanied by a driver, Aimal, who had ambitions of his own: to get rich off the sudden infusion of foreign attention and cash.

In this gripping adventure story, Stern writes of how he and Aimal navigated an environment full of guns and danger and opportunity, and how they forged a deep bond.
 
Then Stern got a call that changed everything. He discovered that Aimal had become an arms dealer, and was ultimately forced to flee the country to protect his family from his increasingly dangerous business partners.

Tragic, powerful, and layered, The Mercenary is more than a wartime drama. It is a Rashomon-like story about how politics and violence warp our humanity, and keep the most important truths hidden.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781541702479
Publisher:	PublicAffairs
Publication date:	03/21/2023
Sold by:	Hachette Digital, Inc.
Format:	eBook
Sales rank:	995,885
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Jeffrey E. Stern is an award winning journalist and author. Stern has written three books, including The 15:17 to Paris, which was turned into a major motion picture by Clint Eastwood and Warner Brothers, and The Last Thousand, which received honorable mention for best book of the Year by Library Journal. He has reported from Yemen, Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantanamo Bay, Kashmir, the epicenter of the west African Ebola outbreak, and Oklahoma’s death row. His work has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, Vanity Fair, TheAtlantic, and other outlets. In 2019, he received the Overseas Press Club award for the best human rights reporting in any medium, and the Amnesty International award for foreign reporting.

Editorial Reviews

01/30/2023

In this ambitious yet flawed dual memoir, journalist Stern (The 15:17 to Paris) chronicles his and his driver’s experiences during and after the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan. Portraying himself as a wannabe reporter who “kept failing and advancing to the next level anyway,” Stern recounts how he paid his own way to Afghanistan in 2007 and fortuitously hired Aimal, who “somehow knew before everyone else when a bomb had gone off and where.” The first third of narrative is told from Stern’s perspective, detailing the scrapes he got into and out of with Aimal’s help between 2007 and 2011. The vantage point then shifts, documenting Aimal’s childhood in Kabul, his arms dealing during the U.S. occupation, and his escape to Canada in 2011. The final section, which seesaws back-and-forth between Stern and Aimal’s perspectives, culminates in their separate efforts to help people escape Kabul during the U.S. withdrawal and Stern’s assistance in Aimal’s reconciliation with his wife. Though Stern candidly admits to “self-absorption” and “misperceptions,” he still casts Aimal mainly in a sidekick role, and the differences between their versions of events are subtle, giving the narrative a somewhat repetitive feel. This aims high but falls short. Agent: David Larabell, Creative Artists Agency. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly

The Mercenary is one of the most important books about America’s longest war. It is a story of two individuals from two different continents brought together by war, and their courage, absolute commitment, and sacrifices for each other will make you laugh, cry, rage, break your heart, then make you laugh again and again until you are healed. It reads like an immersive thriller, but it is more compelling because the events are true and riveting. Mr. Stern has managed to show how the levers of power in Afghanistan devastate ordinary Afghans who try to make a living. The Mercenary is a must-read.—Qais Akbar Omar, author of A Fort of Nine Towers

It’s remarkable how little we understand about what really went on in America’s twenty-year war in Afghanistan. The Mercenary is not just a story about that war—it’s a story about the misunderstanding that defined it. At once heart-pounding and complex, personal and expansive, this book is full of guns and dust and fast cars, but also something key to great war reporting: heart.—Peter Bergen, CNN National Security Analyst

A moving story full of humanity and great curiosity. A riveting and heart-pounding war story. The Mercenary is a special book.—Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin, Oscar-winning directors of Free Solo

This is an extraordinary account of friendship between a journalist and his driver in wartime Afghanistan. Mr. Stern's brilliantly written and unvarnished portrayal of his debut as a bumbling wannabe war correspondent and close friendship with his driver, a man with a shrewd eye for opportunity, provides an important window into the spiral of corruption and violence perpetrated by the West’s war. A must read for those seeking a first hand view into the business of war in Afghanistan and those caught up in the madness.
 —Jessica Donati, author of Eagle Down

“An affecting story of the human costs of a war.”—Kirkus Reviews

"The Mercenary, by Jeffrey E. Stern, is ostensibly about a driver in Afghanistan, but again, it’s so beautifully told and riveting that it’s a page-turner even for people who don’t care about foreign policy. I haven’t stayed up reading this late in a long time."—The Atlantic Daily Newsletter

"A gripping account of the terror and chaos of the Afghanistan war."—Middle East Eye

"Stern’s account of a bond he developed with a cab driver during the early days of the U.S. war in Afghanistan, has accomplished a tremendous feat inasmuch as every paragraph aims to tell the truth."—The Progressive Magazine

From the Publisher

2023-01-12
A journalist recounts a complicated but enduring friendship established during America’s “forever war.”

“He was a kid with bad habits and no money. Now he’s a kid with bad habits and a lot of money.” So writes Stern, the author of The 15:17 to Paris, of the man known variously as Alex or Aimal. The American and the Afghan are both, in a sense, on the make: Stern is looking for the big story that will make his name, while Alex seeks to grow rich, in part thanks to the Americans who flooded the country in 2001. A driver who “gave Westerners rides anywhere in [Kabul] with a reliable, English-speaking driver” for a flat fee of $7, Alex—“none of his customers ever asked how he ended up with a name they could say”—soon discovered that the path to wealth lay elsewhere. While plying a less legal and more dangerous trade, Alex continued to take Stern to see places and people that kept his byline alive. “With a lot of help from Alex and a little help from an industry at the exact right moment of its life/death cycle, I got to work,” writes the author, recounting how he delivered the requisite stories of terror, violence, and redemption, “inoculated against trauma.” Alex had a mysterious way of knowing when and where a Taliban attack was about to occur, and gradually, he became more comfortable among the foreigners—“and he knew why: in their eyes he was becoming more civilized.” Yet, as the Taliban gained strength and the foreigners lost their resolve, Alex’s world crumbled, forcing him to mount a roundabout exodus. This part of the story is overlong, but it shows how Alex successfully gamed the immigration systems of several nations, leading to relevant prosperity, if not wealth.

An affecting story of the human costs of a war doomed to fail because “it began without enough understanding.

Kirkus Reviews