Essay About Louis Zamperini And Pages.Laura Hillenbrand’S Book

Unbroken Book Review
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Hillenbrand, Laura. ​Unbroken​. New York: Random House Publishing Group. 2010. 528 Pages.Laura Hillenbrand’s book ​Unbroken ​captures the breathtaking story of a World War IIAmerican bomber named Louis Zamperini. The book starts with a younger Zamperini in 1929,follows him throughout the 1930’s and continues until 2003. Zamperini grew from a rebelliousyoung boy into a talented Olympic runner, whose career was cut short upon the start of WorldWar II. Zamperini flew numerous missions over the Pacific as a bombardier, but one missiongoes awry and his plane is gunned down into the Pacific. Long weeks passed stranded on a raftwith a few of his fellow soldiers being rescued is very unlikely. After several shark attacks and along battle with starvation Zamperini gains hope when they see an aircraft fly over heard. It isquickly shattered when the plane opens fire on the two survivors. Zamperini survives, and hisraft floats ashore to a Japanese controlled island. From there he is taken prisoner by the Japanese.Zamperini suffers through numerous brutalities in a POW camp. Hillenbrand writes, “Japanesepolicy held that camp commanders could not, under any circumstances, allow Allied forces torecapture POWs. If Allied advances made this a possibility, POWs were to be executed”(Hillenbrand 198). Zamperini stayed a prisoner for over two years, his life threatened every day.Hillenbrand’s book is the depiction of Louie Zamperini outstanding strength and courage in ahopeless time.Hillenbrand wrote ​Unbroken​ for the “general” reader like your everyday student or readerwho enjoys history. In order to truly capture Zamperini’s story Hillenbrand had a lot of researchto do. She came across Zamperini’s story while researching for her other book ​Seabiscuit.​ Uponfinishing her book Hillenbrand spent the next years sitting down with Zamperini and researchingthe time period to ensure detail and accuracy. She not only interviewed Zamperini, but hisfamily, other POWs, fellow Olympians, childhood friends, and even several Japanese officials.As her work on Zamperini’s strong gained following more and more POWs and their familiesreached out to her lending scrapbooks, prisoners’ diaries, including those of Russell Phillips, thebombardier stranded on the raft with Louie, and Commander John Fitzgerald. Hillenbrand’swrote ​Unbroken​ to tell the story of the Pacific War during World War II, and tell it through onecourageous man. Unbroken was praised by numerous critics and newspapers, and was deemedthe number one New York Bestseller for over twenty weeks.Unbroken is a truly astonishing and almost unbelievable account of true resilience andstrength. It was a good read, and I found I could not put it down. It is amazing how one man can