Brooks (World War Z, 2006) makes a U-turn from zombies with this fictionalized account of the famous all-black 369th Infantry. The opening scene of a trench bomb sets the stage for the whole book: endless, grimacing faces and buckets of gore, mostly in the form of exploded bodies splattering across the page. This intro also betrays the book's chief concern: simply telling the story of WWI combat, albeit from an unusual point of view. As a result, the plot is fuzzy and the characters suitably enjoyable placeholders. We follow our diverse bunch from enlistment to training to the hell of France, where they fight through inhumane conditions with the utmost valor, and for what? Prejudice and humiliation at every turn. "They would rather see white Germans," says one soldier, "instead of black Americans march in triumph up Fifth Avenue." White's appropriately cluttered art has the horrific shock value of EC Comics classics like Frontline Combat and Two-Fisted Tales, and the whole thing comes off as resolutely Tarantinoesque. The movie version should be along any second now.