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Born in Forres in Morayshire Scotland on Christmas Day 1956 i lived there until 1966, a rich and happy childhood spent with 3 Brothers and 2 Sisters. My favourite memories are of the time the family spent with our cousins, the adventures and the happiness you only find in the innocence of youth.
In 1966 the Family moved to Kelso in Roxburghshire near the border with England, and I fumbled my way through the early teens whilst failing badly at school. I worked as an apprentice butcher but knew there was no future for me in that, so I joined the British Army at 17.
That was, despite everything the decision that turned my life, I got an education, learned discipline and became responsible for my actions, in short they made me a man. Eighteen years Military Service had a severe Physical and Mental impact on my health and these are the source of the emotions I have used in my writings, there are some very raw emotions to face in my trilogy and in subsequent publications but I make no apology for being honest.
I suffered from Combat Related Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from 1988 onwards and having then served in Northern Ireland and the Gulf War left in 1992.
It took a further 8 years before I began to receive help from Combat Stress
(where most of the proceeds of my books have been going)
They enabled me to survive long enough to find some management techniques to help me some, the one I later developed was the writing of poetry (art has been used for some time with some p
Reviewed by Lori M for Readers' Favorite
I’ve had the privilege of reading one of David McDonald’s earlier books, “There are No Unwounded Soldiers,” and because it was so emotionally charged, I wanted to read another one of his collections of poetry. McDonald is a hero in my view.
In “I Never Raised My Son to be a Solider,” McDonald is angry and lashes out at the government and the politicians who vote to send troops into war in his pieces aptly named “A Politician’s Slaughter,” “A Political War,” and “Who Went to War?” His poem titled, “I Don’t Give a Shit” portrays a soldier being shot in battle, with his blood running into the dirt, considering the purpose of it all and who is waiting for him now.
McDonald beautifully and sadly portrays a battle like a concert in “The Orchestra,” where he writes with such vivid imagery that it makes you feel as if you are there. Take this stanza, for example, “A hail of metal falling like ice, high explosive, poisonous gas, Perhaps something nice in green sir? Rent ground and torn bodies. The start of the movement.” Comparing the start of a movement of music to the start of a battle is riveting.
If you are looking for pretty poetry with happy ending, stars, and rainbows, David McDonald is not your man. But if you are looking for an author with “true grit” who tells the truth about the ugly senselessness of war, then you’ll enjoy this book, as well as his other collections of poetry.
