For James Milton Roberts, his life falls into three distinct phases: growing up on a tobacco farm in eastern North Carolina; witnessing the horrors in Vietnam with the Marine Corps; and battling the personal aftereffects of the war. In this memoir, My Three Shadows, Roberts recaps his past in order to make sense of his present and future. Roberts recalls growing up on a farm, where he picked tobacco and tended the animals. Although it was a time of hardship, he narrates stories of the carefree hours of fishing and swimming in nearby swamps. But his life changed drastically when he joined the Marine Corps and served in Vietnam. My Three Shadows provides a firsthand look into some of the horrors he witnessed. These horrors would haunt him when he returned to the United States. This memoir tells of how post-traumatic stress disorder and repressed memories of war affected every aspect of his life, causing him to lose his family, businesses, and home. But Roberts also shares a story of survival and redemption-how the love of one woman makes him who he is today.
