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shelleebee's review against another edition
5.0
Tim O'Brien is a Minnesotan author just recently added to the IB Prescribed Book List. I was thrilled when I saw his name added and decided to include this, his National Book Award winning novel, to the class. What I like best about this book is O'Brien's blend of fiction and reality in order to access the truth. O'Brien served in the Vietnam War and most of his novels are set there or deal significantly with the war. His best-known work is probably The Things They Carried and is a bit shorter and a bit more accessible as a starting point if you are reading just for fun.
joshuadavid1986's review against another edition
4.0
EXACT RATING: 3.75 stars
Read this during my China study abroad and was kind of blown away but also confused. Would probably enjoy it more if I read it again!
Read this during my China study abroad and was kind of blown away but also confused. Would probably enjoy it more if I read it again!
abbyyyedge's review against another edition
4.0
Good and confusing in a good way. Writers blow my mind sometimes. How did Tim O’Brien even figure out how to write this book. It’s a non linear narrative, plus it has a little bit of magical realism (which just matched the dizziness and confusion and mania of the Vietnam war so well, it really blows my mind). I say, don’t read this just because you liked The Things They Carried because it really is very different. But O’Brien’s style (and in some places, you could tell he was drawing from the same Nam memory as he did in TTTC, I’m looking at you, baby water buffalo scene), so it’s like, if you liked TTTC and also separately are interested in the Vietnam war and this novel as it’s own entity and not as a sequel, you’ll like this. Correlation doesn’t equal causation, kiddos.
Anyways I really liked it and Tim O’Brien is such a good writer imo that it’s ok that he pretty much just writes about Vietnam.
Anyways I really liked it and Tim O’Brien is such a good writer imo that it’s ok that he pretty much just writes about Vietnam.
inseparalien's review against another edition
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
tommooney's review against another edition
2.0
Strange and not what I was expecting. It's a kind of Quixotian Vietnam novel. Peculiar and a little dated.
nrschultz's review against another edition
4.0
Throughout the whole book I was confused by the shift in setting, not so much between the journey and the war stories, more the night watch shift on the beach. The ending really wrapped that up well and made a lot more sense than I thought the book was making the whole way through. There was a section of discussion questions at the end of the edition I read that were very helpful in helping me understand what I just read. I liked it a lot.