Riley Gant took on the insurmountable task of retelling not just one, not two, but three veterans’ stories for the high school club focused on the Veterans Heritage Project.

The Veterans Heritage Club is dedicated to telling the story of veterans of any war, Gant said.

“It is really just to make sure they are immortalized,” he added. “It also helps connect generations.”

Gant got to connect with three different veterans including her teacher’s brother, her own uncle and a Fountain Hills resident.

It is one thing to interview a family member, but Gant found the experience of researching a stranger’s life daunting.

“It is terrifying at first,” Gant said. “My first interview was my great grandfather last year, so I was a lot more comfortable with him. But doing that with someone I have never met before is absolute terrifying.”

There are no writing requirements for the stories themselves. No word count or style mandates, it just needs to fully tell the veteran’s story.

“I am very used to science papers,” Gant said. “I have done capstones and AP writing classes so it took me taking a step back and changing my writing style almost completely. I’m comfortable with the storytelling part of it, so I think the hardest part was introducing it because I am the worst at introductions. So I had to kind of list out their story and do a timeline. ”

Gant found a common theme in the three stories while doing her research.

“A lot of them (veterans) tend not to really want to stand up to be the hero but ended up being the hero,” Gant said. “It is almost like a cliché… Something you would say that never happens but we don’t realize that it constantly does.”

The veterans’ stories are eventually complied into a book that will debut at a reception Gant participated in.

“Being a part of the reception was nerve-wracking, to say the least; being up there in front of everyone,” Gant said. “But it was very impactful seeing different veterans there, hearing different stories and seeing them all together connecting with the people who interviewed them.”

Copies of the book containing Gant’s and many others stories can be purchased on the club’s website at veteransheritage.org.