SOLDIER'S PAY was Faulkner's first novel. In the Summer of 1925, working in New Orleans, Faulkner met Sherwood Anderson, who encouraged him to write a novel. Unlike his later books, this post-war story of a wounded, helpless and dying officer returning home to his father and his fickle sweetheart is set in Georgia, but Faulkner's powerful; depiction of the south, and his extraordinary characterisation, are already evident.