Goodreads asked Nancy Stroer:

Where did you get the idea for your most recent book?

Nancy Stroer Lots of people have asked how much of Playing Army is autobiographical, to which I can only respond - none of it! Yes, I was an Army officer, but I never took over a failing Headquarters Company, and was not stationed at Fort Stewart at the time of the build-up of the peacekeeping mission to the Balkans.

But also - all of it! I was a woman in the Army and had to deal with the intense, non-stop scrutiny of my body, and with the fact that my performance was being evaluated by every single man, even the dirtbags, even as their own right to stand in the ranks was a given. I had to be an effective leader in the face of all that, and the other women were usually my staunchest allies but sometimes my worst enemies. And tragically, the thing that happens toward the end of the story actually happened.

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