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Content snapshot
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Violence
Very heavy
Extreme graphic violence; the torture, degradation, and death of POWs are depicted in harrowing detail
Language
A lot
Strong language appropriate to the war setting
Sexual Content
Some
Adult sexual content in the love story sections
Substance Use
Barely any
Some substance use in the wartime and postwar settings
Emotional Intensity
Very heavy
The psychological devastation of surviving conditions designed to destroy human dignity — and what survival costs — is the novel's full subject
What this book is about
Richard Flanagan's Booker Prize-winning novel centers on the construction of the Burma-Thailand Railway during World War II — one of the most horrific chapters in the history of POW captivity. The conditions under the Japanese and Korean guards are depicted with unflinching historical fidelity. Flanagan intersperses the historical horror with a love story before and after the war. One of the great war novels, and one of the most difficult.
Notes for sensitive readers
Reader-flagged moments and themes that may affect your experience.
Extreme violence and torture of POWs throughout
One of the most harrowing depictions of wartime atrocity in literary fiction
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