Fallen Angels by Walter Dean Myers

Read for: Leisure
Rating: 2.5

Fallen Angels is a Vietnam war story following Richard Perry, a young African American boy in the army. Myers is, of course, an excellent writer, but I just don't think this story was for me. It took me a lot longer to get through than a young adult novel usually would, mainly because whenever I took a break from reading I had to convince myself to pick it up again. Towards the end--the last 100 pages or so--the story became more interesting and held my attention better. There was a lot more action in the last 100 pages, which is what I think I liked better. In the first 200 pages, there was a lot of sitting around and talking, and when the talk is about war it just doesn't interest me that much.

I do, however, think that this novel is an apt representation of what soldiers had to face in Vietnam. I probably wouldn't use it in the classroom because there is a lot of violence and a lot of swearing, but if a student was looking for something about the Vietnam War, I might recommend it to them. The violence isn't gratuitous, and I think the swearing is suitable for what Myers is trying to portray. However, if I did use it in the classroom I would probably meet a lot of censorship problems, and the book just didn't interest me enough to be willing to fight for it.