Fallen+Angels

FALLEN ANGELS by Walter Dean Myers



Ms. Shay's Thoughts: I wasn't a big Vietnam war story fan until I read this book. It's the story of a kid, Richie Perry (PeeWee) right out of high school who decides to join up and finds himself in the middle of the Vietnam war. As was common at that time, black troups often got sent out on the most dangerous missions, so Richie ends up in some dire situations. This is not a difficult book to read, but because it's a war story it's aimed at middle school and up.

BOOK TRAILER

Book Information from __Common Sense Media.org__

Richie, an eighteen-year-old kid from Harlem, joins the army and is sent to Vietnam in 1967. He bonds with the other soldiers in his small squad and watches as some of them die. Richie wonders if he'll live through the year as he participates in the growing violence of the war. A vivid portrayal of the war in Vietnam.

Is It Any Good?
This highly realistic depiction of young soldiers fighting the ground war in Vietnam was one of the first books to illuminate that war for young people. Today's adolescents, who were born after the Vietnam War, see it as history, if they know anything about it at all. The book focuses on the experiences of the soldiers, not on the history of the war. Readers may need to be reminded that this is a novel, not a true story. Myers has the ability to make readers care about his characters and see them as real human beings. Reading FALLEN ANGELS can be an intense experience, one that even reluctant readers may appreciate.