Reviews tagging 'Gore'

Auf Den Feldern Der Ehre: die Tragödie Des Soldaten Pat Tillman by Michael Bayer, Jon Krakauer

2 reviews

natalieba's review against another edition

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challenging emotional informative reflective tense medium-paced

2.5

I struggled throughout my read of this book and likely would have put it down altogether if I hadn’t been listening to it aloud with my husband on a long car trip. There were two main things that caused this for me - one is that I (apparently) don’t like war books and the other is that the premise of this book is show how Pat Tillman’s death was “spun” for political purposes but the author uses this book to lambast the Bush Administration. It’s (of course) the author’s right to have his opinions and voice them, but for a book ostensibly about the harm caused by propaganda to feel like propaganda itself was hard to read. He makes generalizations and assumptions that didn’t seem warranted or earned - one particularly egregious one was about the man who is most likely to have taken the shot that killed Tillman. Krakauer summarized his five page letter in response to his release from the Rangers as him claiming to be the victim, not Tillman, which is not how I read what Krakauer shared and made me want to read the man’s full letter. 

There were other things that bugged me, but this villainizing was laced throughout the book and honestly seemed like something Tillman himself would have (by the author’s own portrayal of him) hated. Tillman (I learned) didn't want to be part of anyone propaganda machine, yet that is exactly where he ended up in Krakauer’s book.  
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hesticht's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional informative sad tense medium-paced

4.25

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