Proud to Be: Writing by American Warriors, Volume 5 presents essays, fiction, poetry, interviews, and photography by military-service personnel, veterans, and their families. The volume also sponsored a veterans' writing competition, judged by Dr. Adam Criblez (director of the Center for Regional History, Southeast Missouri State University), Fred Lynch (photographer, Southeast Missourian newspaper), Terry Lucas (co-executive editor of Trio House Press, son of WWII veteran, and author of poetry collections If They Have Ears to Hear, In This Room, and Dharma Rain), Dixon Hearne (author of Delta Flats: Stories in the Key of Blues and Hope, From Tickfaw to Shongaloo, and Plantatia: High-Toned and Lowdown Stories from the South), and Dr. Susan Kendrick (associate professor of English and chairperson of the Department of English at Southeast Missouri State University). The winners and finalists are spotlighted in the front of the book. The anthology is the fifth in an annual series published by Southeast Missouri State University Press in cooperation with the Missouri Humanities Council's Veterans Projects.