On the Front Line

We learned a lot about Denver journalist Helen Thorpe in last year’s Denver Center Theatre Company stage adaptation of her nonfiction book Just Like Us, the story of four Mexican-American girls and their struggle to better their lives. Throughout the drama, the character of Helen was on stage observing the young women growing up, sometimes from the sidelines and sometimes as an active participant in their disappointments and celebrations. But as testament to Thorpe’s thorough approach to researching and reporting a vividly human story, she was always there, a shadow on the stage as rich lives unfolded.

Thorpe has since turned her perceptive eye to another group of young American women, once again embedding herself in her subjects’ day-to-day struggles for her new book, Soldier Girls: The Battles of Three Women at Home and at War, which looks at how women in the modern military deal with gender discrimination while also keeping track of their personal lives and, at the front, the horrors of war and its lasting effects. With reporting that again hits all the highs and lows in her characters’ lives, Thorpe has created a clear portrait of a new, 21st-century breed of soldier.

Hear Thorpe discuss Soldier Girls with Colorado Matters host Ryan Warner tonight at 7 p.m. at the Tattered Cover Book Store, 2526 East Colfax Avenue. Free numbered tickets for the signing line will be given out with book purchase ($28) at any Tattered Cover location; seating for the program is first-come, first-served. Visit tatteredcover.com for information.

Tue., Aug. 12, 7 p.m., 2014