The Things They Carried (Spark Notes Edition) [Paperback]

Tim O'Brien (Author), SparkNotes Editors (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 84 pages
• Publisher: SparkNotes; Study Guide edition (December 15, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1586638270
• ISBN-13: 978-1586638276
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.2 x 0.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.5 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #435,417 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

TIM O'BRIEN received the 1979 National Book Award in fiction for Going After Cacciato. His other works include the acclaimed novels The Things They Carried and July, July. In the Lake of the Woods received the James Fenimore Cooper Prize from the Society of American Historians and was named the best novel of 1994 by Time. O'Brien lives in Austin, Texas.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

0 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Things They Carried, October 8, 2003

By 

Matt Ramos - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Things They Carried (Spark Notes Edition) (Paperback)

The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien was a well written book about soliders in the Vietnam war. It dealt with the struggles, hardships and pain felt by the soliders in the devastating war of the time. O'Brien focused on the emotions of the soliders before, during and after the war.

Personally, i enjoyed reading The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien. The book focused on the lost emotions of our soliders from the war in Vietnam. As a sixteen year old boy, my eyes were opened to a world where danger is present and everyday could be the last. Although O'Brien jumped around from chapter to chapter talking about unrelevant ideas at times, his use of descritive detail allowed me to be captured by what he was saying on each page. The book as a whole seemed quite cluttered, but the individual chapters brought insight into war that dealt with the challenging of every human emotion. i agreed with most of the passages throughout the book, and could relate to most of the feelings of the main character as a pre-war civilian. O'Brien not only talks about the war; he also deals with the emotions felt before and after the war. i enjoyed reading The Things They Carried By Tim O'Brien, and recommend it to anyone who would like to learn more about the heros of the Vietnam War.