Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Unbroken : a World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption By Laura Hillenbrand

The author of Seabiscuit, read the article in USAToday about Laura Hillenbrand:

http://www.usatoday.com/life/books/news/2010-11-10-hillenbrand10_CV_N.htm

Tension grips the reader from the opening line of the preface:

All he could see, in every direction, was water.

It was June 23, 1943. Somewhere on the endless expanse of the Pacific Ocean, Army Air Forces bombardier and Olympic runner Louie Zamperini lay across a small raft, drifting westward. Slumped alongside him was a sergeant, one of his plane’s gunners. On a separate raft, tethered to the first, lay another crewman a gash zigzagging across his forehead. Their bodies, burned by the sun and stained yellow from the raft dye, had winnowed down to skeletons. Sharks glided in lazy loops around them dragging their backs along the rafts, waiting.

The men had been adrift for twenty-seven days.

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