Enlisting in the Marine Corps the day after Pearl Harbor because there was no line up whereas there was at the Navy's office across the hall, Phillips trained at Parris Island and New River before being shipped to New Zealand for more training. Finally arriving on Guadalcanal, he faced an enemy that didn't fight by the usual rules.

Phillips spends little time on the fighting or the over all picture of the battle for the island. Instead, he focuses on the many humorous events he saw, experienced or heard about. His favourite expression after someone made a mistake or was struck by misfortune and the other soldiers made jokes at their expense was, "No sympathy, nothing nice to say".

Phillips and his sister, Katherine, had roles in Ken Burns's documentary. The War and in HBO series, The Pacific.

Soon after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Sid Phillips enlisted with the U.S. Marines. His book follows him from his enlistment until he mustered out after the war. The heart of the book, as the sub-title indicates, is the time he spent on Guadalcanal. As Phillips states in the beginning of the book, this is not a history of the war or of Guadalcanal. The book is primarily made up of primarily humorous anecdotes surrounding events Phillips was involved in. You definitely won’t gain an understanding of the battle for Guadalcanal from reading this, but the Marines on the island didn’t have much of an understanding of what was actually happening and its broader impacts. I think you do get a feel for what life was like for the Marines there. Phillips was apparently featured in Ken Burns’ documentary “The War”, as well as the recent HBO series “The Pacific”. Worth reading to see the Marine-level view of one of the earliest battles in the Pacific.

I received an ARC of this book from the publisher. ( )

If you saw Ken Burn's documentary, The War or the HBO miniseries, The Pacific, then you already know about Sid Phillips. He played a major role in both by recounting his experiences as a private in a mortar platoon in the South Pacific during World War II. In this book Sid tells in detail his life in the Marine Corps. The day after Pearl Harbor was attacked, seventeen year old Sid and his friend, went down to enlist in the military. There was no waiting in line at the Marine recruiter's office so he signed up. This may have been the only time in his Marine career that he didn't have to hurry up and then wait in line. The boy who entered training at Parris Island would come home a man after enduring the hell of Guadalcanal. It is a tribute to Sid's character, that his memoir dwells not on the tragedy and grief that surrounded this life, but on the rich relationships he formed. Their humor, both light and dark, helped the young Marines endure seemingly endless heat, exhaustion, deprivation, and pain in a campaign that in those early days of the war, left them feeling alone and forgotten. ( )