This was a rather mesmerizing account of experiences prior to, during, and after the Vietnam War. It is a group of interrelated stories which the author states is a work of fiction but who uses his own name as the teller of the stories. O'Brien was against the war but was sent to Vietnam and was with the division that was involved in the My Lai massacre in 1968. He served there from 1969-70 so even if the stories are fictional, he draws on the horrific experience that was Vietnam.
The novel starts out in Vietnam and tells in great detail about the things the soldiers carried on their persons ranging from the necessary military armament to personal items such as letters from a girlfriend. Then there is the horror of the death of some of your closest friends by a stray bullet, a mine, or being sucked into a shit field during a mortar attack. Other parts of the novel tell how the author almost dodged the draft and moved to Canada and how some dealt with returning after the war.
I graduated from high school in 1968 at the height of the Vietnam conflict. I went to college for two years but then when I dropped out, I was immediately sent my draft notice. One of the people I worked with had been to Vietnam and he recommended joining the Air Force because at least then I would be in a barracks instead of out on the front line. So I ended up doing just that and wound up as a Vietnamese linguist stationed in Taiwan and Okinawa monitoring radio communications. I always felt very lucky to have avoided some of the horrors of the war as detailed in this novel and others.
Overall, this "novel" touches on many things and how the soldiers were able to cope with the horrors and tragedies of war.
The novel starts out in Vietnam and tells in great detail about the things the soldiers carried on their persons ranging from the necessary military armament to personal items such as letters from a girlfriend. Then there is the horror of the death of some of your closest friends by a stray bullet, a mine, or being sucked into a shit field during a mortar attack. Other parts of the novel tell how the author almost dodged the draft and moved to Canada and how some dealt with returning after the war.
I graduated from high school in 1968 at the height of the Vietnam conflict. I went to college for two years but then when I dropped out, I was immediately sent my draft notice. One of the people I worked with had been to Vietnam and he recommended joining the Air Force because at least then I would be in a barracks instead of out on the front line. So I ended up doing just that and wound up as a Vietnamese linguist stationed in Taiwan and Okinawa monitoring radio communications. I always felt very lucky to have avoided some of the horrors of the war as detailed in this novel and others.
Overall, this "novel" touches on many things and how the soldiers were able to cope with the horrors and tragedies of war.
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