The Things They Carried

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The Things They Carried
Tim O'Brien
1990

The Summary
Written with the author's personal experiences in mind, The Things They Carried chronicles the violence and aftermath of the war in Vietnam.

Embellished with facts and fiction, Tim O'Brien's novel provides readers with an intimate and emotional connection to the soldiers of Vietnam, as well as insight into the physical, emotional, and mental carnage that occurred before, during, and after the Vietnam War.

The Good
Well-written and dynamic, this novel will keep you riveted from cover to cover.  The Things They Carried provides intimate insight into the lives and minds of soldiers.  It's deep, thought-provoking, and astonishingly compelling.

More importantly, it's an interesting story because so much of it involves fact - perhaps, even reminisces of a memory or two - but it combines factual events with fictional chracters and situations.  It's strange, slightly surreal, but interesting nonetheless.

The Bad
Although O'Brien creates an exceptional novel, his book contains gratuitous amounts of foul language and violence.  Not only is it graphic in nature, it's gruesome and slightly terrifying.

Admittedly, it isn't for the faint of heart - or younger readers.

The Ugly
To be perfectly honest, The Things They Carried is a heavy, emotionally draining piece of work.  Full of graphic details of violence and gore, it displays the most frightening and perilous sides of the Vietnam War from the perspective of a soldier.

Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of this novel, however, is not the elements of fiction which embellish its pages but, rather, how much of it remains factual.