"Unbroken" by Laura Hillenbrand (published 2010)

Unbroken is, hands down, the most engrossing book I’ve ever read. Most war stories I’ve either read or watched, like Black Hawk Down (1999, book) by Mark Bowden, Pearl Harbor (2001, movie) directed by Michael Bay, Apocalypse Now (1979, movie) directed by Francis Ford Coppola or the book the movie was based of off, Heart of Darkness (1899) by Joseph Conrad, In The Land Of Blood And Honey (2011, movie) directed by Angelina Jolie, or Full Metal Jacket (1987, movie) directed by Stanley Kubrick are no doubt great cultural artifacts, but all left me feeling troubled, paranoiac about war, saddened, confused, and even distressed. All of those save for maybe Forrest Gump (1994, movie) directed by Robert Zemeckis cannot compare to the overwhelming grip of hopefulness that Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken (book, 2010) had me feeling the entire time I was reading it. It is not only the most engrossing war book I’ve ever read, it is the most engrossing book I’ve read. Ever. Part of the reason for this is that Hillenbrand seems to put politics aside, and really writes about one man’s life and struggle for survival, both at the extremities of the emotional and the physical. She writes about this man as he came to be a representative for the plight of all the Allied World War II soldiers. Hillenbrand writes with such simple clarity, detail, and depth that I never once struggled to understand the plot or it’s tangents while reading; it felt like my new best friend was right next to me, talking to me, telling me a story of utmost importance. 

The story Laura Hillenbrand tells is the story of Louis Zamperini, a boy born in America to Italian immigrants just before the Depression. Zamperini grappled with bullies (he and his family spoke no English when they moved to California) as well as his own demons, which led him to steal and play pranks on his neighbors and classmates. Zamperini in his old age has said about his young self in an interview: “I was rotten.” While telling his story, Hillenbrand paints a picture of what America was like at the time of Zamperini’s childhood, during the years of 1917 through about 1932, starting with a vivid picture of Zamperini and his older brother Pete standing out in their backyard at nighttime while still in their pajamas to see a Graf Zeppelin hovering above them. Thus begins the saga of the young boy’s journey into a wondrous, cruel, and beguiling world from the Depression and into the World War II.

But before World War II, Hillenbrand tells us of Louis Zamperini’s climb to integrity. He found this integrity through running. Coached by his brother Pete, who noticed that Louis had a knack for running fast miles, Louis directed all his negative energy into something liberating. He began to train all the time and soon became a famous Olympic track athlete, eventually going to Berlin for the 1936 Olympics. Because of Louis’s humble beginnings, Hillenbrand writes to remind us that Louis is a person that has something similar to what a lot of us have, a genuine gratitude for just being in the moment and having opportunities to share and commune with one another. Beyond this, Zamperini’s story teaches us what it really means to persevere and go out there and give life everything you’ve got. Also, Hillenbrand fills the book with very well-researched data on how the Olympic times were managed, run, and stored. Hillenbrand manages to write so well that, though the reader is given an immense amount of information, none of it seems disposable; everything is of extreme interest. I, for one, soaked it all up. 

Louis Zamperini’s story moves forward into World War II when Louis decides to enlist in the United States Army Air Force in 1941. He becomes a bombardier on a B-24 bomber that him and his comrades name the Super Man. Again, the amount of specifics Laura Hillenbrand describes about the Air Force and the planes is absolutely unbelievable. She describes what each crew member’s job was on the plane, what kind of training it took, where each crew member was located… not to mention the failures of the planes, what kinds of problems the WWII soldiers were running into… and what combat in the air was actually like. When Hillenbrand describes a mission in which Zamperini’s crew is set off to bomb Wake Atoll, I felt like I was in the plane, experiencing it myself, feeling like what it must of felt like to have to tell yourself to stay as calm as possible. Although I know there is totally no way of me knowing how those soldiers must have actually felt, Hillenbrand constructed the story so well that I literally felt like I was a part of the story as my heart leapt and cheered the crew and plane on, especially as the plane faltered through gruesome combat. But, to note, interestingly and surprisingly there wasn’t a jolting patriotism that moved me, perhaps because of how Hillenbrand writes. It was a similar but different feeling, one of humanism and the power of the human spirit that encompasses all. 

Further into the book, Louis’s crew is ordered to go on a mission to look for a missing plane. On that mission, Louis’s crew’s plane crashes, and here starts some of the most difficult times of Louis Zamperini’s life. He is stranded on a boat, lost in the Pacific Ocean, for 47 days. Three of the crew survive the crash. Only two survive the days at sea. They are all famished. They learn what it really means to starve and to pull resources together to live. They fight off sharks day in and day out. They survive storms. They find food and scramble to collect rainwater. Louis, never a religious man, makes promises to God and starts praying. During this part of the book, I am telling you, you will not want to stop reading, because you want to see the men live through it. And they do, despite their disintegrating, salt sore-ridden, swollen, and sun-burnt bodies. They sing. They tell each other stories.

But only the worst happens after this. On the 47th day at sea, the two survivors, Louis and his crewmate Phil, are taken as POW’s of the Japanese army. Louis is moved from camp to camp, and is starved, beaten, degraded, worked to death, and put in despicable living conditions. He becomes sick with terrible dysentery and his body becomes covered with more sores. His bones become brittle. Through all of this he forms friendships, he forms intricate plans for survival, and urges himself to still live on. Hillenbrand tells numerous anecdotes about each character so well that by the end of it you’ll feel as if you’ve met these men… and, after a long journey and a hundred plus pages on nonstop action… the war ends after the atomic bomb lands on Hiroshima. Finally, Louis goes home. 

There is still more to the story that tells of Louis trials back in America. It is not an easy ride for him, as he is disturbed by nightmares from war and turns to a brutal alcoholism. But he is miraculously saved by both a woman and surprisingly, religion, and turns his life into something so meaningful and affirmative that at the end of the book you can’t help but feel that you might be a better person just by knowing his story. This is not only a story of war, it’s something much bigger than that, it’s a story that says there are really awful things that happen to us, and for Louis – it was getting bullied, to being put in extremely life-threatening situations, to being literally degraded by corrupt men by having every ounce of dignity stripped away… but where there’s a will, there’s a way, and where there’s belief and faith, there’s always something to hold on to, forever…

I urge everyone who has the time to read this book. You will not regret it. It will leave you feeling uplifted, hopeful, and full of life. It is really just a straightforward story full of complex circumstances that make powerful emotions resonate throughout. Hillenbrand truly shows how any amount of compassion can save the soul at the most dire of times and how we can strive to live through these times to see the light.