Now that's how you tell a story. Any other books that follow the story telling example like in this?

Now that's how you tell a story. Any other books that follow the story telling example like in this?

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  1. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    idk, but I also agree, its one of my favorite war books. Does a great job of expressing the spectrum of moods and experiences without trying to tell you WHAT to think.

  2. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    I killed 3-5 people in Afghanistan and give this book 5 out of 5 stars. It is a masterpiece. I actually did a book report on it in highschool so I was pretty familiar with it before and after experiencing war. O'Brien really gets it on a level that I can't express to someone who hasn't rucked for days on end in the mountains, who hasn't killed people and wanted to do it, who hasn't come back home to a strange new reality. Remarque and O'Brien both perfectly encapsulate the feeling of coming home on leave, or after your enlistment. My dad read this book after I got out. The chapter 'speaking of courage' must have really resonated with him because he actually managed to ask me if I was 'doing ok'. I said I'm fine of course and that kind of stuff doesn't bother me but in reality I was pretty fricking suicidal.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      How are you doing now?

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        I've decided to never kill myself.

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          I hope you change your mind

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      what do you think it was about it? I havent been to war, and I also read it in high school, but I remember it not feeling “constructed” if that makes sense. It was more about sensations and general experienced in a visceral way, like it came from a mind that experienced war rather than was talking about it as a quantifiable “thing”, or faking the particulars of an experience to push a certain “message”. gave a lot of a sense of conflicting emotions, often at the same time and in different directions.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        Yes, that was all very well put. How about this for conflicting emotions. The first mission that I killed someone on went like this.
        >On my 3rd deployment, never had to fire my gun
        >Envious of my friends from other platoons who have seen combat, killed people.
        >Flying low over a river in the door seat of Blackhawk, heading to infil
        >miniguns open up, whatever, probably nothing.
        >I use this opportunity to fire a few rounds into the river so I can at least honestly say I've fired my weapon on a mission.
        >Land, dust everywhere, can only hear helicopter engines, IR lasers cutting through the dust, radio chatter
        >Helicopters leave. Dead silence. A donkey casually strolls through our wedge formation.
        >I'm 3rd man from the front of the platoon formation
        >Passing a compound 25m to my left, handrailing a dirt road
        >Hear the sound of a gun racking in the compounds front doorway, me and the guy in front of me both immediately do a left turn ready up
        >mag dump, go prone, other guy throws frag, by now someone is opening up with a 249.
        >Goes quiet, regroup to continue to actual target.
        >I tell a SL that I got one, he high-fives me, I was happy. We didn't even look in the doorway, just kept moving.
        That mission went on to get way crazier. Lasted until the sun was up. One of our guys got paralyzed, a couple got silver stars. We killed over 40 people total. We were able to verify that because a few days afterwards the ISR drone took a picture of the freshly dug graves. I shot a few more people too. The thing that bothers me is I can't really remember what I saw in that doorway, during the near ambush. I can barely remember it at all, it happened so fast. Did I shoot first? or the guy in front of me? What exactly did I hear? Am I just imagining it was the sound of a gun? Did I even see anybody? Did I see two Silhouettes? A man and his wife? Why did I want to see combat so desperately? Why am I glad I did?

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          I just hope the donkey was okay. The rest of you, have at it.

          • 1 year ago
            Anonymous

            You and me both

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          Very cool reposting posts from the archive, bud

          • 1 year ago
            Anonymous

            Those were me

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          Military conditions you to want to murder, big guy. Don’t be too hard on yourself.

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          good post. again, cant say first hand, but most of the “real” stuff I read, in terms of good fiction and non (i work in a research library, I digitize a lot of stuff like civil war letters) was the conflicting sensations. both feeling formative and oppressing. glad and not. boring and overstimulating. depressed and exalted. proud and shameful. in the moment, and out of body. Another one was thinking you shouldn’t feel a certain way, but you do or did. In the moment, not settling on one feeling because you dont have the time or you have too much time. everything all at once, but none at all.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      Shut the frick up, dude. You spam the “I killer 3-5” goat herders in every thread related to war. We get it, you were neglected as a kid and need attention, but suck start a pistol already so you can become another one of the 22.

  3. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    I read this years ago following a rec from here I think. Since that time, the boat scene was something I returned to, often when people made flippant remarks about courage and bravery. Truly brilliant.

  4. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    i do t agree with all of lindys takes, but I do think he is often introspective, I thought his video on war was compelling. The idea that in modern life everything is paced and to an extent deliberate. even with deadlines or plans none of that is REALLY viscerally pressing. but in war, yiu really get to see who you truelly are as there is no “consequenceless freetime”. when you face mortal peril you see who you truly are for better or worse:

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      About as coherent I expected the typical Lindy fan to be.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      Dang, I typed like a spastic. My bad.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      There is no true, "authentic" you. Or, if there is, it means you've approached life in the most stale, prescribed and lifeless way.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        I mean, wouldnt the you in the moment be the core you? maybe “real” is t the right word. but the de abstracted you. like if you are playing an intense sport and you are in the moment. or you are climbing a hill and a carabiner breaks. the unguarded you.

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