Northern Lights

Excellent debut novel, but Tim O'Brien only got better. All of his tension and emotion in present in this novel, but he still had yet to develope his style and language that has made him, in my opinion, one of America's best writers today.It's a story about privacy. Private lives at home and secret romances of sorts and the return of a Vietnam vet who has a constant reminder of his time In Country, but he never tells the secret of how he received the injury to his ear.It's an excellent debut novel, but don't be discouraged if this is the first Tim O'Brien novel you read, he only get's better. I give it my highest recommendation.It's adventurous and tense when the brothers are lost in the woods. O'Brien paints an impressive picture of the Minnesota woods when these brothers travel at the feet of these enormous snow covered trees in awe and reverence of nature.

O'Brien presents the tension between brothers in layers beginning with the vitnam war. As the story unfolds, O'Brien challenges the reader to think about their pasts and pending futures. The book kept me thinking long after I put it down. Even as I write this reveiw, I am considering new implications to their realtionship. Nothern Lights is a very thoughtful and enjoyable read.

i just read that this book is going to be republished in england. for those who read o'brien's more popular and critically acclaimed works like going after cacciato and the things they carried, they will appreciate this novel, o'brien's first. i felt that o'brien hid a lot more than he revealed in this story and the spectre of vietnam lurked beneath the surface from page one. was he being cautious? not necessarily daring but very subtle and enjoyable. until it gets reprinted, find it at a library.

Paul Perry drags through life, ignoring his wife, nagged and cajoled by his Vietnam-vet brother, and haunted by the memories of his evangelist father. Searching for a source, for something to believe in, Paul embarks on a cross-country ski trip with his brother, and finds their survival depends on him alone...