It was originally published in 1989 by Algonquin Books, and went on to receive the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters Award for fiction.

In an interview with Kay Bonetti, Brown said that “The guys in Dirty Work are actually based on some of the Marines that I met in the early ’70’s in Philadelphia where I was stationed–guys who were in wheelchairs, who had lost their arms and legs and had made that great sacrifice too.

[7] So at some point, Brown admits: “I knew everything I needed to know about the weapons from my training, and I’d talked to enough marines who were in combat to find out what it was like over there.

You just invent the rest.”[4] Brown later revisited the plight of a damaged veteran — and its long term effects on family, friends, and community — through the character of Virgil Davis in his 1996 novel Father and Son.

They tell each other their respective stories, mostly during the course of one night, while they drink beer and smoke pot that Braiden's sister has smuggled into the hospital for him.

To tell you the truth, I don’t know.”[10] Theology Today’s review of the novel states that: “The spirituality of these Dirty Work vets is mature, self-critical, tempered by continuing struggle, purified by tears of compassion.

It evidences that rare gift, the courage to face the full truth about life and love (what James Baldwin called life’s ‘terrible laws’) in spite of the ever-present temptations of culture and religion to ignore such truth.”The plot of the novel borrows from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, which is referred to in the novel.