Book Review: Unbroken

I'm only six years late to this party. And by "party," I mean "incredibly gripping tale of the horrors of WWII."

And I'm not alone in that positive assessment. A staggering 85% of Amazon reviewers give it 5 stars. (Harry Potter number the first is only barely ahead of it, at 86%.)

My review is not going to do it justice. Like, not at all. Mainly because the whole dang book is so dang intense that I didn't pause to take notes or think existential thoughts or compare it to other works. I just tore through it. When was the last time that happened, that I was so held by a story that I didn't pause to breathe? ...Maybe Hunger Games. Take that as you will.

What did I learn from this book? Well...

1) SO MANY WWII pilots died in training accidents. Or searching for lost planes. Or searching for the searchers. As my SO succinctly put it, "Life in wartime is cheap."

2) The atrocities against human dignity committed on the Pacific front were truly terrible and terrifying. We learn a lot in school about how bad the Nazis were, and rightly so. They were awful. But the POWs of Japan were intensely mistreated.

3) If being attacked by sharks, puff up and bop them on the nose. If a starving airman who had been floating in a life raft for weeks without food can do it, so can you.

4) Life can endure past the point of believing, if the spirit remains unbroken.

...and that's all I got. For serious, go read this book. But don't be ashamed to skip the torture scenes, because those are squick.

xo,
Devo