Memorable Monday #59 — Veteran’s Day Edition

Welcome to Memorable Monday! The purpose of Memorable Monday is to showcase an influential book read in the past that still sticks with you today. This fun Monday morning post is hosted by the lovely Becca at The Becca Files.

This week, I am featuring:

The Things They Carried

by Tim O’Brien

Amazon

My dad is a Vietnam Vet. He served in the US Air Force from 1967-1971. Growing up with a wounded war vet was sometimes not the easiest thing, but it did teach me to be grateful. I sometimes take for granted the sacrifices our soldiers make so I can have the freedoms I enjoy today.

The Things They Carried is an exquisite, eye-opening novel. It showed me a brief glimpse into what our young soldiers experienced in Vietnam. My dad is a quiet man when it comes to Vietnam, as I suppose all war vets are in regards to the wars they’ve served in. It was actually this book that got him to open up a little to me. The first time I read this novel, I was a Junior in high school. It wrecked my world. My dad realized I was struggling with this novel assignment my teacher gave, so he shared a couple little things about his time in Vietnam. Some of the things were funny, and some were scary. I am grateful he shared some of these things with me because it helped me to understand him a little better.

I just want to say to all who have served our great United States by enlisting in military service, THANK YOU! I am honored by your sacrifice, and I am so grateful for your service.

About this Book

In 1979, Tim O’Brien’s Going After Cacciato—a novel about the Vietnam War—won the National Book Award. In this, his second work of fiction about Vietnam, O’Brien’s unique artistic vision is again clearly demonstrated. Neither a novel nor a short story collection, it is an arc of fictional episodes, taking place in the childhoods of its characters, in the jungles of Vietnam and back home in America two decades later.