Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption in Crazy Challenge Connection

Feb 06, 2016 Olivermagnus rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction, zjuly-2024, 2024, ww2, x6

This book opens with bombardier, Louis Zamperini, lying on a raft in the Pacific on June 23, 1943. He and three other survivors of a plane crash are starving skeletons after 27 days at sea. Sharks are circling their leaking raft. Suddenly, a plane is spotted. They fire off a flare, only to discover the plane is a Japanese bomber, which begins a strafing run. While reading the first two pages it's impossible to believe this is a true story. Leaving us in stunned suspense, the author takes us back This book opens with bombardier, Louis Zamperini, lying on a raft in the Pacific on June 23, 1943. He and three other survivors of a plane crash are starving skeletons after 27 days at sea. Sharks are circling their leaking raft. Suddenly, a plane is spotted. They fire off a flare, only to discover the plane is a Japanese bomber, which begins a strafing run. While reading the first two pages it's impossible to believe this is a true story. Leaving us in stunned suspense, the author takes us back to the beginnings of Louis' life.

When we first meet young Louis he seems to be headed in the wrong direction. He spends his early days burglarizing homes, stealing cars, and jumping onto railroad boxcars. While evading the cops with his incredible speed, his brother tells him he should join the track team, which eventually leads him to the 1936 Berlin Olympics as the man most likely to break the four minute mile. After Pearl Harbor, Louis joins the Army Air Force, trains as an air bombardier, and flies 37 successful combat missions in a B-24 bomber in the Pacific War against Japan. Then he gets unlucky. Shot down by a Japanese Zero, Louis and his two surviving aircrew ditch amid thousands of miles of empty ocean.

Taken to a Japanese POW camp Louis is beaten and humiliated with appalling regularity by one particular guard, Mitsuhiro Watanabe, nicknamed "the Bird" by the prisoners. As sport he was made to race against Japanese runners. If he won, he was bludgeoned into unconsciousness. A constant round of beatings, abuse, starvation and torture reduces Louis and his companions to skeletal zombies. You will shudder as you read the details of the brutality these men endured. Upon release from the prison camp, Louis returns to home a broken man. His marriage falls apart and he becomes an alcoholic. He can't seem to cope with life, and who can blame him. One day he attends a revival conducted by Billy Graham and turns his life around. While the first and last parts were not as riveting as the POW sections, I am still giving this book 5 stars.

"Unbroken" wasn't an easy book to read. The beginning, especially the time stranded at sea, was quite dramatic and fascinating, but once the action switched to the prison camp I had to skim over some of the more sadistic actions of the Japanese guards. But then I though that I owed it to Louis to read the details. All I had to do was read his story, while he had to endure it for over two years. While painful to read in some cases, it's probably one of my very favorite non-fiction books. ...more

8 likes · Like · see review

May 23, 2013 Chaitra rated it really liked it

Shelves: non-fiction, war, world-war-ii, biography, survival, military

World War II is a topic I read a lot about, both fiction and non-fiction, and most of my reading has led me towards Germany and its final solution atrocity. Not much that I've read focuses on the other third of the Axis forces, beyond Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Unbroken happens to shed light on one of the topics I'm not too familiar with beyond some vague knowledge - the Pacific War and the Japanese (mis)treatment of the PoWs.

The frame is that of Louie Zamperini, an Olympic runner turned bombardie World War II is a topic I read a lot about, both fiction and non-fiction, and most of my reading has led me towards Germany and its final solution atrocity. Not much that I've read focuses on the other third of the Axis forces, beyond Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Unbroken happens to shed light on one of the topics I'm not too familiar with beyond some vague knowledge - the Pacific War and the Japanese (mis)treatment of the PoWs.

The frame is that of Louie Zamperini, an Olympic runner turned bombardier who is lost at sea, and is then held captive in a Japanese PoW camp under the most awful dreg of humanity Japan could have produced. It's a great book, by turn enjoyable and horrifying. At the end of it, I comprehend, if not share, the view that the nuclear bombs were necessary - Japan wouldn't have surrendered without them and it was essential for Japan to surrender. I'm glad to have had that school of thought fully explained, it's the one that I was missing. Zamperini's story is well told, and I was fully invested in his extraordinary tale till the very end.

That said, two (minor?) things bothered me. The first was Mac. Pvt? Lt? Frank McNamara eating all the chocolates on the first day of their being lost at sea. I'm not disputing the story, I'm bothered by the fact that it was not revealed until this book, and Mac isn't around to dispute this. Neither is Phil. The second was Louie's turn-around from an alcoholic to a stone-cold sober man of Jesus after two sessions with an evangelist. I do believe that Billy Graham 's sermon helped Louie when he was in a bad spot, but the two session miracle healing from what was a terrible case of PTSD was, well, a little incomplete. Especially since the book just skips forward from that point on to the epilogue. He must have struggled a bit more with his nightmarish experiences? Also, I must have nodded off towards the end, because I sure didn't know Louie had a son until I googled him after completing the book.

Despite all that, I truly enjoyed this book. It's a wonderful story, grippingly told. I'm glad to have read it, and I'm glad that there were so many people, including Louie Zamperini, who survived their ordeal and made something of their lives. 4 stars. ...more

2 likes · Like · see review

Dec 02, 2014 Chris Torretta rated it it was amazing

Oh! This book!! So many feels!

The gun cracked, the men rushed forward, and the race was on. Lash bounded to the lead, with Bright in close pursuit. Louie dropped back, and the field settled in for the grind.

The beginning of the book was quite dramatic. I loved Louie from the start. He wasn’t perfect but sadly he was hurting people. Once he realized this he knew he had to stop and change his ways, but how!? His brother Pete and his family was a great influence. Family is always an influence whet Oh! This book!! So many feels!

The gun cracked, the men rushed forward, and the race was on. Lash bounded to the lead, with Bright in close pursuit. Louie dropped back, and the field settled in for the grind.

The beginning of the book was quite dramatic. I loved Louie from the start. He wasn’t perfect but sadly he was hurting people. Once he realized this he knew he had to stop and change his ways, but how!? His brother Pete and his family was a great influence. Family is always an influence whether we see it so plainly or not. In the case of Louie they were a good, a very good influence. I also loved his mother, although it was Pete that really pushed him to find the greatness within.

A photographer climved inside the plane and snapped a picture. Taken in daylight in the dark of the plane’s interior, the image showed shafts of light streaming through the holes, a shower of stars against a black sky.

With all of the drama at the beginning I was dreading reaching the point of his captivity but with such poignant writing I couldn’t help but race through the book. His military days were fantastic and I could feel myself living vicariously through his happy days. I wanted to meet the people he met, go on the trips he went on, and enjoy life as much as he did! At least until…

Nobody’s going to live through this.

22% into the book and it starts getting deep. Really deep. I started to feel myself being afraid for his life, wondering how he was going to survive. He kept many journals so there wasn’t a guarantee (unlike my hubby who knew about Louie Zamborini, I had not heard of him) that he was going to live. I wanted to avert my eyes, stop reading, anything to forgo re-living the traumatic events that led to his capture. And they are TRAUMATIC! But I could not help myself. The more dramatic the events the more I wanted to rush through the story and learn his fate.

On a side note… never, EVER ask yourself

After a plane crash, Louie replied, what more bad luck could they have?

More about the actual writing, although the story was tremendously heavy and amazing and nearly unbelievable, the writing was exceptional. I do not think I could have gotten through this much horror without such exquisite writing. It was lyrical in parts and very deep in others and even had a slight spirituality in certain areas.

The fight for this place had ripped the jungle off of the island.

In short: This is an epic battle with not only outside sources, there are many, but also with his own spirit. This will leave you stunned but it is major food for thought. This is definitely a must read and I cannot wait to see the upcoming movie! ...more

Like · see review

Nov 01, 2015 Lorna rated it it was amazing

I listened to this on CD. I think that is why I enjoyed it so much. Had I read through all the details, I think I would have given up on the book. It was so well read that I had a much easier time following along.

1 like · Like · see review

Jul 31, 2017 XiangYu rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favourites, nonfiction

This book starts off with summarising the life of Louie Zamperini from his boyhood marked with cunning, yet genius acts, him competing at the Berlin Olympics and even catching the eye of Adolf Hitler, enlisting as a WWII bombardier, eventually being stranded at sea with his flight mates Phil and Mac. Yet, more trials await Louie, until he finds redemption for the unspeakable sufferings, years after the end of the war.

That being said about Louie, this book is written using a third person narrator This book starts off with summarising the life of Louie Zamperini from his boyhood marked with cunning, yet genius acts, him competing at the Berlin Olympics and even catching the eye of Adolf Hitler, enlisting as a WWII bombardier, eventually being stranded at sea with his flight mates Phil and Mac. Yet, more trials await Louie, until he finds redemption for the unspeakable sufferings, years after the end of the war.

That being said about Louie, this book is written using a third person narrator which was very appreciated. There was broader perspective for the entire book, being able to glimpse into Louie's life, knowing more about his stubbornly loving family, fellow war comrades and me being educated on the Pacific war. Initially, I had thought this would be a straightforward history sum-up kind of book but no, I was taken aback several times, flipping back a few pages to reread in disbelief. You would think that there was only so much cruelty in the world...

As much as this is a nonfiction book centring around the Second World War, there were unbelievable comic moments, even during a flight on the bomber B-24 Super Man:

On another day, to get even with Cuppernell and Phil for regularly stealing his chewing gum, Louie replaced his ordinary gum with a laxative variety. Just before a long day of sea search, Cuppernell and Phil each stole three pieces, triple the standard dose. As Super Man flew over the Pacific that morning, Louie watched with delight as pilot and copilot, in great distress, made alternating dashes to the back of the plane, yelling for someone to get a toilet bag ready. On his last run, Cuppernell discovered that all the bags had been used. With nowhere else to go, he dropped his pants and hung his rear end out the waist window while four crewmen clung to him to prevent him from falling out. When the ground crew saw the results all over Super Man's tail, they were furious. "It was like an abstract painting," Louie said later.

An incredible genius, that is what Louie Zamperini is. Not only with Louie, but with everyone in the book I felt attachment. Laura Hillenbrand's writing brought all of them to life.

I hereby admit that I do not have a marked interest in History, but a slight interest in military operations. Me borrowing this book from my library was only encouraged by me having signed up for a nonfiction book challenge in one of my Goodreads groups. However, reading this book was not at all difficult. It is a compelling read through and through. I do not have any surviving grandparents but I would think that this would have been their experience, probably not as trying as Louie's and his comrades'. A deep respect for the war veterans.

This book would have been great for the younger me learning about the Second World War in my classroom. Correction, I learned about how Singapore fell to the Japanese Occupation, with little to no attempt at understanding the events on the global scale. Arguably I was much younger then (around 10 to 12 years old) but I believe, now as a 20-year-old human being, that having a broad global perspective on major historical events such as this War itself, would mould my way of understanding this world better. Instead, my focus for 10 years or so had been more or less restricted to the three-year Japanese Occupation. I believe that younger schooling children would benefit greatly from obtaining a global understanding, not only about the European war but the Pacific war as well. ...more

Like · see review

Jul 24, 2013 Megan the Vegan marked it as to-read

Like