Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand, is a story about an Italian immigrant, Louie Zamperini who was bullied and turned to smoking, drinking and stealing. His parents urged him to be like his older brother Pete, who was the total opposite of Louie. Eventually Louie hit a turning point and started to run with his brother encouraging him by riding behind him on a bike. He lost his first race badly, and wanted to give up but Pete still forced him to work hard. He started to win more and more, he got so good he eventually qualified for the 1936 Olympics in Berlin. The whole world watched and listened as Louie made history by completing a lap in less than a minute, which was a world record at that time.

Shortly after that, he became very sick and lost his speed, he started to lose more and more races and as soon as the semester was over as USC he left, and he was only few credits short of a degree. He took a job as a welder at the nearest Air Corps base as soon as the world fell into another world war, Louie was drafted into the Air Corps. He worked as a bombardier and had many successful missions against the japanese, many times barely escaping with his life. On day on a rescue mission over the Pacific, his barely airworthy B-24 started to break down right over the Pacific Ocean and Louie, the Pilot, Phil, and Mac, the tailgunner have to do their best to survive on a raft until their hopeful rescue. Louie sees bombers in the skies and uses a flare gun but the crewmen always miss their signal.

After many weeks they finally got rescued, but not by who they wanted. The men were captured by the Japanese Imperial Army and now must fight to survive against the brutal conditions inside the work camps that the world knew little of. He met a sadistic corporal the other captives called The Bird, he seemed to go crazy over the smallest things and Louie became a daily target. Louie knows that if we gives up he will die of sickness or get killed by the Bird so he doesn't give up and pushed through every day. He will not be broken.

The author’s goal in this story was to tell the readers about Louie’s story and how he refused to give up. The theme of this story was to never give up and try to push through struggles. Overall, I recommend this book to anyone who likes a story about survival and pushing through the brutal conditions of war.