The Land that Touches Mine
John Sanford
Introduction by Jack Mearns
August 10, 2021
ISBN 9780578937953 / Paperback / 226 pages / $15.99

The eighth novel by John Sanford, The Land that Touches Mine (1953) tells the story of a World War II Army deserter, whose deep love for America collides with his disillusionment at its failure to honor its founding ideals.

Upon publication, The New York Times lauded the book's "muscular and economic prose," calling the book "a poetic, tragically intense tale" and "an absorbing narrative by a writer of great distinction and ability." In England, the New Statesman likened Sanford's language to Soldier's Pay and Under the Volcano, noting his skillful use of italicized flashbacks, while the Manchester Guardian commended the novel's "combination of the tough and the tender," calling it "curiously real and satisfying."