Customer Reviews

If I Die in the Combat Zone

5 star:		(29)
4 star:		(16)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Tim O'Brien is an extraordinarily talented writer. This painful and disturbing memoir of his year as a foot soldier in Vietnam, is a vivid and heartfelt chronicle.

O'Brien "grew out of one war and into another." He is the son of a WWII soldier, "who fought the great campaign against the tyrants of the 1940s." His mother served in the WAVES. Drafted in the summer of 1968, "Nam-bound," O'Brien thought the war was "wrongly conceived and poorly justified," and seriously planned to escape to Canada, or to Sweden. However, his entire history of life on the American prairie, the values instilled in him by parents and teachers, pulled him in another direction. In the end, he submitted. "It was an intellectual and physical standoff, and I did not have the energy to see it to an end. I did not want to be a soldier, not even an observer to war. But neither did I want to upset a peculiar balance between the order I knew, the people I knew, and my own private world. It was not just that I valued that order. I also feared its opposite - inevitable chaos, censure, embarrassment, the end of everything that had happened in my life, the end of it all." Thus, he articulates, so well, the reasons that many of my generation, far less eloquent than he, went silently off to fight a war they did not believe in - and too many never returned.

As a woman from the "Vietnam generation," this book was very painful to read. Yet, I cannot recommend it highly enough. I was still a girl, in so many ways, when Tim O'Brien landed in Vietnam. And he, and our peers, were still boys. I will always feel wonder at their courage - even if they did not feel particularly courageous. How did the regular guys I graduated school with, manage to shoot and be shot at? If there are any answers to my questions about what happened "over there" and why, this book gives me a pretty good idea. I travel into combat with the author, walk over minefields, feel the red earth of Vietnam, as he digs eternal holes to lie in at night. I also feel some of his horror, pain, disillusionment, and admire his dark humor.

O'Brien writes beautifully, with great sensitivity, of that terrible time. "Do dreams offer lessons? Do nightmares have themes, do we awaken and analyze them and live our lives and advise others as a result? Can the foot soldier teach anything important about war, merely for having been there? I think not. He can tell war stories."

A thinking man in Vietnam was a dangerous thing. Being a soldier in Vietnam was a dangerous thing. Tim O'Brien was both and somehow he managed to live to survive it and tell his story. He ends up in Vietnam after unsuccessfully dealing with his conflict between doing the right thing and being a courageous man. He tells of his decision not to follow his well planned escape route and stay with his country and its proposal to send him to Viet Nam. O'Brien describes Vietnam as a place with nameless soldiers and Buddys, faceless enemies and endless minefields.

This is an excellent text for learning about the experience of the Vietnam war, the choices that young man were faced with at that time and basic dilemmas in making moral decisions. It is a well written book which makes for a quick, satisfying read.

This is an excellent piece of literature. O'Brien is at his finest as he transcribes his experiences during the vietnam war. If you read "The Things They Carried" (which he wrote after this) you'll definately love this book. It's also interesting to observe some of the similarities to the characters in this memoir to those in The Things They Carried. It's exceptional, honestly. You wont be disappointed.

As a Marine grunt(1968) In Vietnam, the book basically gives a good view into daily 'NAM' LIFE. Other reviewers gave a low rating thru their WELL-> READ knowledge of the war. There is a old Vietnam unwritten code "if you were not there, then you have no idea what happened or should not judge the ones who were. Vietnam vets don't talk about our experiences over there because there is no way a civilian could comprehend what we endured". The war was a horrible, minute by minute effort to stay alive but also a duty to protect your fellow marines , your fellow marines were your brothers. Read the book. Semper Fi

A vivid description of the day to day life of a grunt in the Vietnam era. O'Brien wrote honestly and at times poetically of his experience from draft day to his return home. Some of the best writing on a thinking man's reaction to combat that I've ever read.

O'Brien is simply my favorite author. I was curious to read this, his first book, a memoir of his real days in country. It is without the lyrical beauty and power of some of his other fictionalized accounts of war, but as he says in How to Tell a True War Story--what exactly is real in war? This is as close one can come...a fascinating account--perhaps most interesting is the down time--the mundane aspects of war. His honesty is disarming (no pun intended), but the polished O'Brien we know and love is still developing. It is an important book and worth the time spent.

Being much more familiar with Tim O'Brien's fiction, one may not know what to expect in his memoir about his tour of duty in Vietnam. Written in the same style with a wry sense of humor, O'Brien challenges the war in a way few have.

Courage and morality are continuing themes that O'Brien explores through his actions as well as literary quotes. It is very clear that O'Brien was uncomfortable with the war even before being drafted. He even contemplates going AWOL. In a paradox, he lacks the courage to go to war or escape going to war. Nothing is more powerful than the last chapter. Going beyond patroitism and rituals, O'Brien is numbed as he returns home. The war has left a mark that is difficult to fathom.

Tim O'Brien does not flinch at the brutality of the war nor the American soldiers. Major Callicles seems straight out of Catch 22, yet he is all too real. The cruelty to a blind civilian has the ability to disgust. While making a statement, O'Brien's writing is both enlightening and entertaining. It is a remarkable perspective on a disastrous war.

I think this is an average book, although quite honest from the Author. I have heard a lot of Tim O'Brien but this is the first book I read of his. It is much more an anti-war book then a war book. In this account anyway, I find the Author's arrogance towards other soldiers who he calls GI's although I hadn't heard that term in reference to someone in the Army since WWII. I might not have heard it due to where I served in the Marines, small, remote areas in and near the DMZ. And my experience doesn't include Korea.

He comes from a family where he had people serving during the war, WWII that is. But his self interest and cowardice, his own description of himself in Nam, got the best of me. I can see all the acclaim once placed on this book because of its anti-war stance at the time and for many years thereafter. When you start out an intellectual in boot camp and describe how much better you are than everyone around you kinds of drags on a two tour in Nam vet. I can't say that what he describes as his Vietnam didn't happen but in my years there from 66, 67 & 68 didnt see an ounce of it. Disappointed indeed.

Having learned about Vietnam at school, including individually watching some films about it, it was only coincidental that I could reinforce my knowledge of the war with a book. I'm glad that it was with "If I Die in a Combat Zone".

The author's writing is simple yet evocative enough to allow easy reading with a serious tone. If you're the type who looks up every word that you're not familiar with, this book should give you a sizable, though not too huge (that it'd disrupt reading) inventory of new words.

The story itself is interesting, taking on the perspective of a soldier (I guess it is the author himself) combating Vietnam and his views of the war. However, I personally felt the combative scenes could have been written more vividly--in terms of tumult and stimulation. Despite that, the plot moves along fast enough to maintain interest and activity.

I would have definitely read more of O'Brien's narration in "If I Die in a Combat Zone"--209 pages is just not enough!

These are the most elegantly written memoirs about the horror that was Vietnam. It is a thorough telling of the tales in which innocence is lost and wisdom is gained. I am glad that O'Brien toured in Vietnam or else we would not have been blessed with such a wondeful work of literature. Just read the last few lines over and over. They'll make you cry. The most beautiful writer of his generation.