The Things They Carried

This modern classic and New York Times best seller was a finalist for both the 1990 Pulitzer Prize and National Book Critics Circle Award and has become a staple of American classrooms. Hailed by The New York Times as "a marvel of storytelling", The Things They Carried’s portrayal of the boots-on-the-ground experience of soldiers in the Vietnam War is a landmark in war writing. Now, three-time Emmy Award winner Bryan Cranston, star of the hit TV series Breaking Bad, delivers an electrifying performance that walks the book’s hallucinatory line between reality and fiction and highlights the emotional power of the spoken word.

The soldiers in this collection of stories carried M-16 rifles, M-60 machine guns, and M-79 grenade launchers. They carried plastic explosives, hand grenades, flak jackets, and landmines. But they also carried letters from home, illustrated Bibles, and pictures of their loved ones. Some of them carried extra food or comic books or drugs. Every man carried what he needed to survive, and those who did carried their shattering stories away from the jungle and back to a nation that would never understand.

This audiobook also includes an exclusive recording “The Vietnam in Me,” a recount of the author’s trip back to Vietnam in 1994, revisiting his experience there as a soldier 25 years before, read by Tim O’Brien himself.

The Things They Carried was produced by Audible Studios in partnership with Playtone, the celebrated film and television production company founded by Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman, and producer of the award-winning series Band of Brothers, John Adams, and The Pacific, as well as the HBO movie Game Change.

For more from Audible and Playtone, click here.

©1990 Tim O'Brien (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

Reseñas de la Crítica

"Cranston may be the most charismatic embodiment of moral ambiguity we currently possess. There was always something comforting as well as menacing in Walter White's voice, and Cranston attacks O'Brien's sober, sinewy prose with slightly scary authority.... [I]f you were a binge-watcher of Breaking Bad it will be no big deal to spend six hours in his company here." ( The New York Times Book Review)

"Structurally the novel gestures to William Faulkner's As I Lay Dying, while Ryan's sensitive observations on Irish life seem responsive to the work of his compatriot Patrick McCabe. That Ryan does not look out of place in such literary company is a measure of his achievement." ( The Financial Times)

"The best of these stories--and none is written with less than the sharp edge of honed vision--are memory and prophecy. These tell us not where we were but where we are, and perhaps where we will be. . . . It is an ultimate, indelible image of war in our time, and in time to come." ( Los Angeles Times)

"O'Brien's haunting collection of connected stories about the Vietnam War is more alive than ever in this narration. Bryan Cranston's resonant, sometimes formal, performance often leaves the listener reeling. Cranston's voice is deep and patient, laying back to let the characters' collective pain take the fore. Memorable scenes include a man's receipt of his draft notice in "On the Rainy River," battle scenes in "The Man I Killed," and aspects of the war's aftermath in "Speaking of Courage." In all the works, Cranston offers a measured, compassionate voice. O'Brien's stories emphasize the importance of telling the truth of war stories, and Cranston's respect for his intent is clear and comforting. At times, his sonorous tone is hypnotic, but this is more an asset than a liability. All the better to make the listener feel." ( AudioFile)

a modern classic

It's been all over Audible for some time now: a great war story and narrated by Bryan Cranston! Let's get the obvious over with first: Cranston is incredible and you could buy this book on his involvement alone. That said, let's talk about the book, it's mostly good points and its few downsides.

The Things They Carried is small stories, not very interconnected, from Vietnam. They are not in order and they do not connect at the end to tell some larger story. But they paint a wonderful mosaic of how soldiers come back from war traumatized and we can understand the mental plight of soldiers who were witness to horror. We'll look at stories of men drowning, firefights, trying to dodge the draft, and coming home from war and not being able to integrate into society again. These are nearly perfect moments in time and told with such precision and care that you'll be astounded. My favorite story was of a soldier coming home and driving around a lake, wondering if there is anyone he could tell his story to, the story of how he almost won the Medal of Valor.

But the author doesn't know how to end the book and it slows down and then just stops. I wish there was more there, that there was a more impactful story to end on, but for me the least interesting moments of the book are at the end. Afterward is a short story separate from the book, read by the author. He is not the narrator that Cranston is, but do listen to this story, it is exceptional. If only it had been the end of the book...

Do buy this book, it's not only good, I dare to say it's important.

Meandering

While the explicit imagery sows the savagery and fear that I could only dream of, his memoirs seem desperate and shallow.

I guess there are precious lessons that only experience can teach, but this left me a little depressed

Terrific Narration, Overwritten Book

I've had this book on my shelf for many years, but seeing Bryan Cranston as narrator made me finally "read" it. It has many good details about the Vietnam War and some anecdotes I hadn't heard before, like the story about the teenage girl who goes out with the Green Berets. But O'Brien is heavily dependent on iteration as a dramatic technique and I find it tiresome. Is it really important to the book that we be told, maybe 20 times, that the author is now 43 and that he's writing about himself at 23? There's a lot of this and I didn't find it effective, just time-consuming.

Kudos to Cranston though.

VIETNAM VETERANS AND VICTIMS

Listening to “The Things They Carried” reminds baby boomers of Edwin Starr’s 1969 anti-Vietnam song, “War”. The reminder is in its refrain, “What is it good for?–“Absolutely nothing.”

“The Things They Carried” reinforces history’s judgment of Vietnam. Vietnam was an un-winnable war; entered into by the United States with ignorance equal to benighted judgement in Iraq.

One of my two half-brothers served in the 101st airborne in Vietnam. In truth, we rarely saw each other but he never talked about his Vietnam’ experience. He died at 62 years of age. He was a financially successful business man but now I wonder how much of his life was affected by senseless war—I hear Edwin Starr’s refrain. “The Things They Carried” makes one worry about all war veterans and victims; on both sides of senseless war.

amazing

once I started listening I could not stop... I had read this book several times through and decided to give the audio book a try when I saw who was narrating it... simply amazing.