books: billy lynn's long halftime walk

i have two books i have to catch up on and then i promise i'll make some kind of commentary about being in melbourne for the past 6 months or whatever it's been. some profound life affirming shit i am telling you. or probably not. it's been a bit disappointing in that regard but i don't want to spoil the emotions of that post so lets talk about the emotions of soldiers instead.

i do not want to guess at the emotions of soldiers because i have and probably will never have an experience that comes close to modern warfare. well, aside from playing call of duty: modern warfare which no doubt is pretty close to the real thing and that can get pretty emotional sometimes. i yell enough in horrible screams of rage for it to seem convincing enough. but anyway here we have a book about some soldiers returning from the line of duty, having proven themselves tremendously in battle, and being paraded around to the dumb masses.

some may and have argued that this book lacks subtlety, and maybe i'm just simple, but i found the themes and ironies and pointed fingers to be very poignant and not at all over the top. and i was quite charmed by billy lynn as a person, particularly the juxtaposition of his inner thoughts and his outward manner to the fawning texan public. it is a book that makes you feel good about not liking war and also not liking your fellow (or not) americans.