Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand

Hello my darling readers! Have you all been reading with the new year?  I read a couple of books from Isabug's parcel that arrived the day after everyone's departure including the A.J. Jacobs book (as written about on other blogs) and Little Princes.  I really liked them both.  Also, I just finished Laura Hillenbrand's (Seabiscuit) new book Unbroken --it's in the Audible library for those of you who are authorized with the secret code.  I recommend it for a wonderful change up from fiction.  Also, I recommend it highly as a "manly book" and I'd put it into the Jon Krakauer company.  It's a very flat, level, detail-rich true story of Louis Zamperini -- who is still alive by the way -- a juvenile delinquent, Olympic runner, WW II airmen, Japanese POW, and all-around inspiration!  Reading it took me back to Mere's and my little visit to the WWII memorial in Washington D.C with Grandpa and filled me with such affection for men like him and their ilk.  Truly, they maybe are the "Greatest Generation" and tough beyond measure.

If you read Seabiscuit, you may remember the journalistic, dry quality of that book.  And, while the story was about Seabiscuit there were a multitude of side roads into the lives of the people who intersected with that horse as well as the horse industry of the day.  Unbroken is much the same -- rich with interesting facts, colorful people and the nature of the war in the Pacific.  The story telling is dry but like a good wine, sometimes dry is just the perfect thing. Plus,  I don't know about you, but while I feel pretty well-educated about WWII and the war in Europe, I'm not particularly informed about the War in the Pacific other than Pearl Harbor and maybe the Burmese Death March.   I now feel so much smarter.

So...Unbroken -- great for long runs in the cold (or on the treadmill).  Try it, you'll like it.