Young Louie Zamperini was by definition, a trouble maker. Making messes, stealing food and causing mischief in Torrance, California since he was a little boy but was always able to run surprisingly fast away for pursuers. Louie was known for starting trouble but those days built him into an intelligent clever man that could always find himself out of trouble. Louie looked up to his older brother Pete and wanted to be exactly like him. However, his family never gave up on him during his trouble maker days, so much so his brother was the one who turned his ife around by arguing Louie out of explosion and introducing Louie to track.
Louie was outstanding at running and lived for applauses so he thought he would give it a shot. Louie was a natural at track breaking high school records and eventually starting training for the Olympics and have the opportunity of going to the Berlin Olympics in 1936. It was there that he trained to break the four minute mile a world record at the time. Louie ended up placing seventh in the race but breaks the final- lap record with a time of 56 seconds. Louie attends the University of Southern California where he breaks the NCAA record for a mile with a time of 4:08.
Louie’s running career was cut unfairly short when WWII broke out and he was enlisted. Louie found him being a bombardier on a historic plane, The Super Man. Louie’s job as a bombardier was to spot out enemy targets, take over flying the plane toward the target and yell “bombs away”. On this plane he met who would be a vital friend later on, “Phil” Phillips. Phillips was a natural pilot and was a key factor in Louie’s survival throughout many of his war experiences. Louie and his crew was stationed in Kahuka, Hawaii.
At one point in the story it was only Louie’s intelligence and Phillips pilot skills that managed to land the Super Man with five hundred bullet holes throughout the plane. That was the last ride for the Super Man, after that the crew was transferred to the Green Hornet. The Green Hornet instantly gave Louie a bad feeling but he had no other choice in the matter. The next morning there sent on a search mission in the unreliable plane. Ironically on this mission Louie’s plane went down landing into the ocean leaving only 3 survivors.
Phil, Louie and Mac were left stranded at sea floating n an orange raft at the mercy of fate itself. Throughout the isolated time on the raft Mac lost his mind, Phil struggled with the guilt from the crashing being the pilot and Louie never failed to amaze them catching a shark on his own and proceeded to eat its liver. Mac emotionally lost himself and later died at sea. After forty-six days on the raft Louie and Phil finally think their struggle is over, but really it has just began. They are captured by the Japanese and are transferred to multiple POW camps that test the boundaries of Louie and Phil’s strength.
Louie urvived the camps even though he was pushed to his ultimate limits, getting abused daily, having little to no food and watching the friends he tried to make all die slowly. Finally Louie returns home to his family but they all instantly know his experiences damaged him extremely. Louie married the love of his life Cynthia and they have a daughter. Louie is constantly reminded by the horrors he faced while at war which turns Louie into an alcoholic. After becoming an alcoholic Louie is no longer able to run and has no plan of trying to find a new career. Ending up to ll backfire on his marriage when Cynthia starts to doubt the marriage.
Their marriage hits an all-time low when Louie is caught shaking the baby by Cynthia and she files for a divorce. Cynthia’s mind changes when she notices that Billy Graham is in town. Cynthia talks to Louie about to attending one of Billy’s tent preaching sessions and Louie follows through with going. Louie realizes that it is time for him to change when he remembers that he made a bargain with god while he was stranded on the raft. Through Louie’s faith he was able to quit drinking and later become an outstanding motivational speaker. As years past after the war Louie starts become more and more humble as the days pass.
Louie forgave everyone that did him wrong during the war. Louie gains information that the bird, a general at a POW camp, was still alive. The bird made Louie’s life hell while he was in the camp but surprisingly Louie wanted to meet with him to forgive him. The bird refused to meet Louie but he still sent him a later. In more recent years Louie carried the 1998 Olympic torch past Naoetsu where he was imprisoned before. Louie left everything in the past and moved through the moment Throughout Laura Hillenbrands writing she used good organization. Laura organized the story in logical order following the life of Louie Zamperini.
She started by explaining the early life of Louie then proceeding on the timeline of Louie’s life. Laura’s used expository writing as her writing style throughout the book. Expository writing is written in logical order and usually explains something in a process. Laura described Louie’s life in a logical order explaining his life. The fairness of Laura’s writing is based off of if what Louie was telling her the truest story possible. Laura met with Louie multiple times to interview him and nail his story to be able to have all the information she needed to write the factual story of Louie’s life.
Throughout the book there was excellent use of aids. Offering many visuals of the appearance of Louie and what he was experiencing during the war. There were pictures of what a bombardier does, all the planes used during this period of time, how the war looked and the POW camps. The use of aids helped me to be able to visualize the story much better. Laura made sure to talk only about the major events that would occur throughout Louie’s life o give you a better understanding of the events he had to overcome to survive.
She would discuss the awful occurrence’s that would happen in the POW camps that will leave you vomiting. This book helped me to better understand what U. S citizens had to deal with during World War II. Also helped me to better the type of society we had during the 20th century. I was able to understand how harsh World War Il was and obstacles that United States soldiers endured will fighting for our country. This book directly relates to our class because it helps you to better nderstand WWII which was the second deadliest wars in U. S history.
Currently in class we are learning around this current time period in history and the hard times our citizens had to face. Personally I really enjoyed this book. The life store of Louie is an attention grabber and Laura did an excellent job on telling the full story of his life without adding any bias to what she learned about him. I selected this book because of all the wars throughout United States history I have always been excessively interested in WWII and I am a sports fanatic. This story combines both of those opics into one story and grabbed my attention from the start.
Laura Hillenbrand was born on May 15, 1967 in the northern suburbs of Washington, D. C. She began writing at an early time in her life. She attended Kenyon College and was diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome confining her to her house. She wrote her first book in 2001 called Seabiscuit and wrote her second book in 2010 called Unbroken. Laura came across Louie’s name in a newspaper about his running career and was intrigued right away. Without knowing of his wartime experience she was already hooked and later seeing his name nd reading about his whole wartime experience.
Laura wanted to know more about him so she went out of her way to get in contact with him. After she got ahold him she was told the amazing story of Louie Zamperini and was captivated. She felt as if the whole world needed to hear this story and that’s what she did. This book is not controversial at all, it offers an in depth story of a U. S figure that should be acknowledged for his efforts in the war. Laura gained all of her information through interviews with Louie himself. She was told the story of Louie Zamperini through the first person view.
