Christina Houck - Fallen Angels

By Anonymous -
I'm almost finished with this book.  There is so much detailed content for me that it is taking a bit longer than I anticipated to finish this novel.  From what I've read so far, I am taken aback by the events of the war in Vietnam.  First, I never would have imagined that the soldiers could have been taken into the war with so much inexperience.  Yes, Perry went through training, but his unwillingness and unpreparedness to participate in the war seems shocking to me.  Prior to reading this novel, I believed that people went to fight in the war because they wanted to stand for America.  It seems like Perry joined the army because he ran out of "better" options.  It makes me wonder, to what point of ignorance does someone join the army because they have nothing better to do.  I want to believe this plays into Perry's inability to make sharp and intellectual decisions in the midst of fighting.  Instead, he reacts on instinctual panic and fear.  
I don't really care for Perry's character much either.  He doesn't seem to have much of personality to him; instead, he just recalls the scenes, conversations, and fighting that he witnesses.  Because of this, I don't feel very attached to Perry.  I'm almost more attached to PeeWee's slightly crazed personality and pop-off-the-wall temper.  He doesn't seem to think before he acts, but at least he has a sense of humor.  
Something that really got to me was the use of the Vietnamese children as weapons in the war.  As I've mentioned before, it is my dream to have children and become a mother.  It disturbs be that someone could throw away a child's life like the women did in this book.  I mean, attaching a mine to a child and handing it into the arms of a soldier?  It's barbaric and sickening.  That scene made me sick and angry.  It made it worse when the American soldiers gunned down the second child, without giving him a chance to live.  I understand that it was no longer an option to leave the child be, but it makes my heart hurt.  These children didn't ask to be a part of the war; why make them suffer?
Overall, the events that occurred in this novel was a true eye-opener to the horrors of war.  I had family who lived during these times and must have witnessed these things.  My grandfather was a veteran, and he really refused to talk about his time in the army.  From what I've understood, when he came home, he was completely different.  That is to be expected.  After reading about the atrocities that occurred in the Vietnamese war, I know that, had I witnessed these things, I would be different, too.  It has given me a new perspective on the terrors of modern warfare.

Comments

  1. StephanieDawkinsNovember 14, 2016 at 9:49 AM

    I definitely agree that Perry was not well prepared for the war and the combat that he went through. However, I do not believe that it was a simple decision for Perry to make to join the war and I do not believe it was an act of ignorance but an act of survival. He did not want to work a minimum wage job that would barely provide for him and he dd not want to fall victim to the streets. Where I am from a lot of people have made the same decision because that was the best decision for the situation.

    ReplyDelete
  2. UnknownNovember 14, 2016 at 8:54 PM

    No, Perry definitely wasn't ready to go toe war. I don't think anyone his age could ever be really "ready" for something like that. That being said, I feel like calling his decision "simple" is really more of a comment about his approach to it. There were other options, but he chose to go to war because it seemed like the best one. Do you think he'd do it again, knowing what he did by the end of the book?

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Growing Pains - The Symbolism of the Tree in Speak

By -
I have felt the paralyzing pain of internal disease. The kind of trauma that causes your mouth to curl in and swallow you whole. I, like so many other women, are walking the halls in Melinda’s shoes in “Speak.” I thought Laurie Anderson did a phenomenal job of twisting all of the tribulations a high school girl goes through, into the tree that Melinda is. Whether we’re as strong as an oak or weak as a bush, we have all gone through the disease that strikes Melinda from the inside out. Melinda is like a half-dead tree. Some parts of her strive to blossom and create beauty. Other parts are broken and diseased. Like a dead tree, Melinda needs to save herself and “cut off the damage, [so it] is possible for the tree to grow again” (187). The symbolism of a tree is significant in “Speak.” Trees reflect her growing process. In the beginning, Melinda is a sick and lifeless tree. Her view is negative and dark. She’s so far past repair, bursts of sunlight do her no good. Sunlight would be pe...
Read more

How Starr Goes from Acting to Embracing in The Hate U Give

By -
In The Hate U Give, Starr Carter is caught between two worlds. She lives in a predominantly black neighborhood, but her father sends her and her brothers to a private school where she is surrounded by white people. She talks about acting differently depending on what group she is around, which can create some identity problems. She says on page 11, "Funny how it works with white kids though. It's dope to be black until it's hard to be black." When at Williamson, she sees white kids that think it's cool to engage in black culture, but she knows they don't understand what she goes through in her Garden Heights community. She witnessed her friend Natasha's death when she was 10 years old, and she sees gang activity in her community all the time. When she is among her black friends, like at the party, they tease her for hanging out with the white kids. This reminds me of a Drake song where he says, "I used to get teased for being black, and now I'm...
Read more

Postmodernism in Curious Incident

By -
Before I start writing, I first want to acknowledge that I just really loved this book! It seemed like a lot of the class had trouble enjoying or appreciating the novel because it's so different stylistically, which is understandable, but all of those unique elements helped make the novel more authentic. The main topic I want to focus on (also what I'm writing my paper on) is how a lot of postmodernist elements were used in the novel to make Christopher come to life. While obviously not every postmodern novel is about an autistic kid, I think Haddon really used a lot of these elements to his advantage and they ended up working out really well to characterize Christopher. One of the major postmodern elements which helps this book really craft an authentic portrayal of autism is the fact that it's metafictive. Basically, this means it's a "story within a story." Readers would be extremely limited just reading the parts of the novel which are meant to be C...
Read more