I was pretty sure I was going to eventually read Laura Hillenbrand's Unbroken. I am not sure there was a 2010 year-end best-of book list that I did not see it on... like many I was a fan of her first book, Seabiscuit (and the movie too... and, no surprise, this book is already in development for the big screen)... it had a stratospheric rating on GoodReads (4.61 average, 67% 5-star ratings, 94% 4 or 5-star ratings... and that's over 3,000+ ratings!)... and Todd read it as his first book of 2011 and was in that GoodReads majority. But what pushed me over the edge, was NPR Books picking it as their first "social media" book club selection, featuring it heavily -- with Hillenbrand's participation -- on Facebook and Twitter for the month of February.
And to get it out of the way right at the top, this was truly an amazing, incredible, "you couldn't make this kind of stuff up" type of story. One really does run out of superlatives for it. As it tends to be with these historical/memoir-y, it tells the story of someone that you are left scratching your head about why you've never head of them before (a similar way I felt with Henrietta Lacks). It seems like maybe I should have heard about Unbroken's central 'character' in Louie Zamperini as he did gain fame as one of the fastest longer distance runners in the 1930s, which took him to Hitler's Berlin Olympics (though I guess in the track and field department it was fairly easy to be overshadowed by Jesse Owens at the time). But while that early part of Louie's story is certain interesting, it is not until he ends up serving in WWII in the Pacific that his story truly takes turn after turn after turn.
I joked during this book that it really should have been called "Unrelenting" as just when you think things couldn't get any worse for Louie, it typically did. As I typically do, I'll zip my lip here but I can not imagine anyone will be left scratching their heads how all of this possibly could have happened to one man! Though there are allegedly 50+ pages of notes and appendices that back it all up... on my Kindle the book actually stops at about the 75% mark, with the rest being notes. Hillenbrand was well aware that folks would have a hard time believing this one!
Now while I never moved from thinking this was a 5-star story, I still found myself leaning towards thinking it was a 4-star book and I felt pretty darn guilty about it even more so about reading about Hillenbrand's (who is my age!) own struggles with chronic fatigue syndrome that leaves her house-bound, if not bed-bound (you can read about in this WaPo piece). How she managed to compile the massive research it took for this book, let alone meticulously weaved it all together truly is worth a book of its own. But at the end of the proverbial day, I just found myself "respecting" the book more than "loving" it. It's kind of like when I finally got around to reading Jonathan Franzen, it just maybe all seems a bit too perfect and polished (which I know is hardly a criticism). Also, if this makes any sense, it just felt I was "watching" it unfold vs. "experiencing" it, just an ever so slight disconnect. I think part of it too may have been given the title (and definitely the subtitle) that there was a lack of tension of how it would all end, tho this is not to say that there weren't many surprises along the way.
But I will end by back-pedaling and say that I certainly do not want to discourage anyone from reading Unbroken. Again, it is embarrassing how much of this I did not know about and Hillenbrand does a great public service here in bringing Zamperini's story into the spotlight, breathing life into not only his story, but truly all those of this "greatest generation," in a way no history book or class ever could.
Yay! I have an ARC of this book that I grabbed as the bookstore closing came to light. I'll be sure and put it on the top of the TBR pile.
Posted by: Joanna | Friday, February 18, 2011 at 03:06 PM