Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien

Things They Carried (4th Estate Matchbook Classics)

by Tim O'Brien

The million-copy bestseller, which is a ground-breaking meditation on war, memory, imagination, and the redemptive power of storytelling.

`The Things They Carried' is, on its surface, a sequence of award-winning stories about the madness of the Vietnam War; at the same time it has the cumulative power and unity of a novel, with recurring characters and interwoven strands of plot and theme.

But while Vietnam is central to `The Things They Carried', it is not simply a book about war. It is also a book about the human heart - about the terrible weight of those things we carry through our lives.

Reviewed by alindstadtcorbeax on

5 of 5 stars

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One of the most amazing books I’ve ever read; life changing.

A pretty unique read, esp in writing format.

The novel is about war. A fictional (although content seems non-fictional but the format and way its magically written reads as fiction) book about the Vietnam war; Which I have NO interest in war reads unless it’s in a fantasy book, honestly. It is not a YA book either, def an adult read.

BUT the fact that my father fought in the Vietnam War, and that this book is written just so, so, beautifully and amazingly which really hooked me from the get-go ! I was SO emotional. Definitely tears on so many pages. Tim O’Brian was ultimately responsible for me loving this fiction realism book, which is near impossible!

Prepare Yourself- I’m about to get REAL personal:
Sorry to be a downer, but I think it’s important here. My dad passed away ultimately from COPD (lung disease), cause proven by doctors that it was from Agent Orange in Vietnam. He also had lung cancer (which he was told he had 6 months to live and lived 10 more YEARS. It was a miracle). My dad was my best friend. He ultimately passed away on my 25th birthday (wtf! July 8th 2014; So horrible), so f*** the Vietnam War.
BUT somehow this book made me feel closer to him, and understand him more, and even love him even more (which I didn’t know was possible).
Okay, downer over. Sorry about that.

But you can probably imagine why I was so emotional about this book. But truly even besides that, just was so amazing; in fact I loved it from beginning to end. No boring sections for me. I was glued. The author also has a way of attaching you to characters so MAJORLY that you feel like you know them. Even without my personal story, so intriguing, EMOTION CITY, so uniquely written that it captures you from the absolute very beginning.

You really need read this book! Stat!

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Reading updates

  • Started reading
  • 26 April, 2005: Finished reading
  • 26 April, 2005: Reviewed