A review by mrdietz
Flyboys: A True Story of Courage by James Bradley

4.0

An engaging, well-research account of a terrible time in world history. Bradley's Flyboys takes a long view of the second world war, providing a number of chapters that spell out plenty of Japanese history before the war even begins. I enjoyed this large view of the war, but some readers might be disappointed to learn that the stories of the central boys doesn't really take hold until the back half of the novel. The prose makes explicit the violence of warfare. I also appreciated Bradley's effort to give fair blame to the atrocities committed throughout the war by both the US and Japan. War makes humans commit terrible acts. The hope is that reading about these people, these families who were torn apart by loss and destruction, that a new generation can keep such violent conflicts from happening.