Book Review: Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand

 Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand is brilliant. This should be required reading for all high school students.

The beginning part of the book is the delightful story of Louie Zamperini, a mile-runner ("miler") in the late 1930s. He smashes local, state, national, and international running times. He participates in the 1936 Olympics before Hitler in Berlin, Germany. Louie trains for the 1940 Olympics and came within seconds of being the first man to break the four-minute mile. However, the 1940 and 1944 Olympics were cancelled due to WWII. But, this only covers the first 25% of the book.

Louie and his beloved brother Pete

The remaining three-fourths of the book is Louie's life as a bombardier for the Army Air Corps., stationed on Funafuti Island. He and his crew have great successes against the Japanese. They have an epic battle over Nauru, a tiny yet military-strategic island between the Marshall Islands and the Solomon Islands in the Pacific. In April 1942, their faithful B-24 bomber Superman was badly damaged in the fight against Japanese Zeros (as well as wounding most of the crew). Louis and his pilot Russel Allen "Phil" Phillips are "volunteered" to join another flight crew to conduct a search for a missing airplane and its crew. This time, Louis and Phil are ordered to take The Green Hornet, another B-24 bomber notorious among the pilots as a defective "lemon plane." It lives up to its reputation.

Funafuti and Naura Islands
(middle, right)

While on the search, mechanical difficulties caused the plane to crash into the ocean 850 miles west of Oahu, killing eight of the eleven men aboard. Zamperini and Phil survive the crash with another crewman Francis "Mac" McNamara. Mac died after 33 days at sea. They drifted for 2,000 miles. On their 47th day adrift, Zamperini and Phil see land in the Marshall Islands, but they are captured by the Japanese Navy before they can reach the island. For three years, they were held in captivity and severely beaten and starved until the end of the war in August 1945. Zamperini was especially tormented by sadistic prison guard Mutsuhiro Watanabe (nicknamed "The Bird"). The brutality of the Japanese treatment of their prisoners of war is......unspeakable.

Louie's perseverance is astonishing. Not only does Louie survive his days as a POW, but he helps many other POWs survive as well. The Bird never breaks Louie's spirit. Eventually Louie forgives the Japanese prison guards. He even visits them in Japan! The book does conclude with Louie's life through the years. Thankfully, the author also tells what happened to the other prisoners.

Louie, 95 (2012)

All these years I have learned much about the European half of WWII. But, I never knew so much about the Pacific portion. This is why this book should be required reading. It tells the real-life story of an American soldier and his days as a POW. It relates how amazing our Armed Forces truly are and his, and their, ability to triumph over great adversity. I hope everybody reads Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand. It's required reading for you too.