Where to Start with Laura Hillenbrand: A Reading Guide
Where to start with Laura Hillenbrand — how to approach Unbroken, her essential account of Louis Zamperini's impossible survival story. A complete reading guide.
By Oliver Kane
Laura Hillenbrand (born 1967) is an American author who has published two books, both of which became major bestsellers and cultural phenomena: Seabiscuit (2001) about a Depression-era racehorse, and Unbroken (2010) about WWII bombardier Louis Zamperini. Both were adapted into films (Ron Howard directed Seabiscuit; Angelina Jolie directed Unbroken). Hillenbrand has suffered from severe chronic fatigue syndrome since her college years, which means she has conducted most of her research from her Washington DC home, unable to travel to the locations she describes.
Where to Start: Unbroken (2010)
The essential Hillenbrand — and one of the most extraordinary narrative non-fiction books of the century. Unbroken opens a life that could not be invented: a mischief-making Italian-American boy from Torrance, California who finds his discipline in running, qualifies for the 1936 Berlin Olympics as a nineteen-year-old, and is expected to break the four-minute mile within a few years. Then Pearl Harbor.
Zamperini’s wartime experience is so extreme that Hillenbrand’s task as a writer is partly to make the reader believe it. The B-24 crash in the Pacific, the 47 days on the raft — during which the three surviving crew members fought sharks, hallucinated from sun exposure, fended off Japanese strafing attacks, caught albatrosses and ate them raw, and watched one crew member die — is among the most harrowing survival narratives in literature. The POW camp sections are more sustained and in some ways harder: the systematic dehumanisation, the beatings administered by the camp guard Mutsuhiro Watanabe (whom the Allied forces listed as a war criminal and whom Zamperini called ‘The Bird’), the deliberate targeting of Zamperini as a famous American athlete.
Hillenbrand’s craft is the reason the book works as well as it does. She does not explain the emotional significance of what she is describing; she builds the scenes carefully enough that the emotion is produced in the reader rather than stated. The pacing is exceptional — the raft sections in particular have the momentum of the best thriller fiction — and the research depth is visible in the specificity of every scene without ever becoming academically heavy.
The postwar sections, which follow Zamperini through PTSD (before it had the name), alcoholism, and eventual conversion to Christianity through a Billy Graham crusade, are the book’s least dramatic but in some ways most honest: the war does not end when the prisoner is liberated.
Reading Laura Hillenbrand
Begin with Unbroken — it is her most celebrated work. Seabiscuit (2001) is her other major book, with comparable narrative craft applied to a very different subject. Both standalone.
For the full Laura Hillenbrand bibliography, reviews, and biography, visit the Laura Hillenbrand author page on Editors Reads.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Where should I start with Laura Hillenbrand?
Unbroken (2010) is Hillenbrand's essential and most celebrated book — the account of Louis Zamperini, an Olympic runner turned World War II bombardier who survived 47 days adrift in the Pacific Ocean and then two years in Japanese prisoner of war camps. One of the most extraordinary narrative non-fiction books of the century; the research is meticulous and the narrative craft is exceptional.
What is Unbroken about?
Unbroken follows Louis Zamperini from his Torrance, California childhood (a juvenile delinquent turned distance runner) through his appearance at the 1936 Berlin Olympics, his enlistment as a bombardier after Pearl Harbor, the crash of his B-24 in the Pacific, 47 days on a raft with two surviving crew members, his capture by the Japanese Navy, and over two years of imprisonment in POW camps — particularly his treatment at the hands of the camp guard known as 'The Bird.' The book follows Zamperini through the postwar years and his eventual path to reconciliation and peace.
How did Hillenbrand research Unbroken?
Hillenbrand spent seven years researching Unbroken, conducting extensive interviews with Zamperini (who was in his eighties during the primary research period), searching military archives on multiple continents, and tracking down surviving POW camp inmates and their families. Hillenbrand herself suffers from debilitating chronic fatigue syndrome and conducted much of the research from her home by telephone and correspondence — she did not travel to Japan or the Pacific locations she describes. The research depth is evident throughout the book's exceptional accuracy.
What should I read after Unbroken?
After Unbroken, Hillenbrand's Seabiscuit (2001) — about a Depression-era racehorse and its unlikely human team — is her other major work, with the same narrative craft applied to a different story. For comparable WWII survival narrative non-fiction, Sebastian Junger's Tribe and Michael Lewis's The Blind Side both cover extreme human endurance from different angles. For the Pacific War specifically, James Bradley's Flags of Our Fathers covers the Iwo Jima campaign with comparable research depth.
