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greatlibraryofalexandra's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
tense
fast-paced
Memoir.
This is very raw, very emotional, uncensored, irreverent, and violently poetic. I appreciated it a lot. The organization was pure chaos and it was hard to follow chronologically. It was also very male in a toxic, gruesome, but … appealing? way. I’d recommend it, and I recently watched and loved the movie.
This is very raw, very emotional, uncensored, irreverent, and violently poetic. I appreciated it a lot. The organization was pure chaos and it was hard to follow chronologically. It was also very male in a toxic, gruesome, but … appealing? way. I’d recommend it, and I recently watched and loved the movie.
kandicez's review against another edition
5.0
I read and listened to this on CD. It makes it so clear how damaging it is to these young men to be kept in such a prolonged state of battle readiness for...nothing! How can they possible not be warped in some way by that. I don't mean they are all coming home crazy, but it just can't be good for the mind or soul of anyone!
sashathewild's review against another edition
4.0
Read by the author, which, in this case, is a very good thing.
zhelana's review against another edition
3.0
Swafford somehow managed to write a war story that didnt make me miss the army. I think he was too crude, and focused too much on the reasons he hates the marine corps (doesn't everyone love and hate the corps? Where was the love?)
browncharlotte18's review against another edition
3.0
This was a forced read for one of my classes. Otherwise, I would never have read this book as I'm not interested in war books. However, I enjoyed the honesty and transparency Swofford provided. Although the explicit language can be a bit much, I feel it added to the story and was necessary.
xxstefaniereadsxx's review against another edition
informative
reflective
medium-paced
3.0
This book is the first memoir written and published about the Gulf War by a frontline infantry Marine. I read this book after seeing the movie. I watched it with my exboyfriend who wanted nothing more in his life to be a Marine. (He did grow up to become one.) This book is sentimental to me for this reason, but it was a good book. It was a moving account of someone suffering through wartime. I did like the book better than the movie, but this is just really sentimental to me.
librariann's review against another edition
I wasn't a big fan of the U.S. Military before reading this book and am even less so afterwards. This is because Swofford does an excellent job of portraying his experiences, from enlistment to returning home. The last 50 pages, while he is at war itself, can drag.