HOLLAND (WHTC-AM/FM) — Ruth Price believes God planned for her son, U.S Marine Gunney Sgt. Daniel Price, to die in an Afghanistan combat zone.
She believes the bullets that ended Dan’s life were meant for her son “from the beginning of time.”
He died July 29, 2012, while serving in Badghis Province, Afghanistan, as part of Operation Enduring Freedom, fighting with the 1st Marine Special Operations Battalion based in Camp Pendleton, CA.
He was 27. Coming to grips with her son’s death continues to be a journey for her and her husband, Karl Price.
She coped by writing about her smart, willful, loving, and talented boy. Like other Gold Star mothers, she feels someone must tell Dan’s story.
“I’ve always wanted to write a book. Not this book. I wanted the ending to be different. but this is the book that God gave me,” she told WHTC morning host Gary Stevens. “When Dan was killed I said, within the first couple of weeks, that ‘Now I have to write this book.’”
The writing took time, she said, time for research, and time for tears.
“Lots of emotions, lots of tears, lots of laughter,” she said. “Remembering the good times, remembering the bad times.”
In doing the research — reading his military commanders’ evaluations, for example, she learned so much about her son that she never knew. Effusive praise from his superiors, she said, was genuine, having been written well before he died.
Ruth Price picked a book title that reflects her faith and loss: “No Stray Bullets: The Making of an American Hero.” God took care of her family before, during and after the time that her son Dan was killed, she said.
The book is available at Readers World and via Amazon. Listen to Ruth Price’s WHTC interview.
