War is a sensitive subject, no matter what side of politics anyone chooses to be on. However, Tim O’Brien decided to tackle the idea head on in his novel, The Things They Carried.

O’Brien had the novel published back in 1990, but the lessons from the story are still relevant today.

O’Brien uses colorful characters like Jimmy Cross, Kiowa, Bob “Rat” Kiley, Norman Bowker, Curt Lemon Henry Dobbins, Mitchell Sanders and Ted Lavender to tell their stories about the Vietnam War. The stories range from outrageous and hilarious to thought-provoking and humanistic. The stories are broken up by “chapters” of short stories.

However, there is one character that makes readers scratch their heads with wonder; at least, it confused me. O’Brien puts himself in the story.

O’Brien is a real-life Vietnam War veteran, but the book is non-fiction. However, when he tells his character’s stories, he insists that all the stories are real and truthful. Readers have to keep in mind that the book is fiction, thus what he is saying could be based on his experience, but it is not true on the pages.

The stories hit home, especially with O’Brien. In the story “The Man I Killed,” O’Brien talks about the young Vietnamese fighter that he kills. He comes up with a past, present and future in his head, regretting his decision to kill him. While many other soldiers congratulate him for his kill and elaborate on what a good job he did, O’Brien takes a more humanistic approach and is somber about the situation.

The theme of maturity is shown throughout the entire series. O’Brien goes from being a scared young adult that was drafted into the war into a man who has made mistakes, but has learned from them. He went from trying to escape from the draft and head off to Canada, but instead took responsibility and went to war to serve his country.

O’Brien’s novel isn’t one to pass up. His other books that he’s written, including Going After Cacciato and If I Die in a Combat Zone, also follow a Vietnam War theme. However, The Things They Carried is certainly the better of the three, due to the variety of characters, their stories and the important message of personal beliefs and duty to your country.

I give The Things They Carried four out of five stars.