The Things They Carried - Tim O’Brien

When prompted to think about the personal side of soldiers at a Geopolitics and Geostrategy class at university, our Professor recommended us this book from Tim O’Brien, in which you read, via an unusual storytelling, the lives and thoughts of young soldiers in the Vietnam war. Although the episodes are fictional, everything is based on the author’s real experience and history. The things they carried meditates on the values (for instance compassion or grit) and spirit behind each soldier, what they carried and how they felt.

A beautifully written book on War and the human side of people fighting in it, which can only make sense to revisit now, with both Russian and Ukrainian soldiers fighting a few kilometers away from us.