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Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk

3.89 of 5 stars 3.89 · rating details · 5,802 ratings · 1,128 reviews

A finalist for the National Book Award!

A ferocious firefight with Iraqi insurgents at "the battle of Al-Ansakar Canal"—three minutes and forty-three seconds of intense warfare caught on tape by an embedded Fox News crew—has transformed the eight surviving men of Bravo Squad into America's most sought-after heroes. For the past two weeks, the Bush administration has sent th...more A finalist for the National Book Award!

A ferocious firefight with Iraqi insurgents at "the battle of Al-Ansakar Canal"—three minutes and forty-three seconds of intense warfare caught on tape by an embedded Fox News crew—has transformed the eight surviving men of Bravo Squad into America's most sought-after heroes. For the past two weeks, the Bush administration has sent them on a media-intensive nationwide Victory Tour to reinvigorate public support for the war. Now, on this chilly and rainy Thanksgiving, the Bravos are guests of America's Team, the Dallas Cowboys, slated to be part of the halftime show alongside the superstar pop group Destiny's Child.

Among the Bravos is the Silver Star–winning hero of Al-Ansakar Canal, Specialist William Lynn, a nineteen-year-old Texas native. Amid clamoring patriots sporting flag pins on their lapels and Support Our Troops bumper stickers on their cars, the Bravos are thrust into the company of the Cowboys' hard-nosed businessman/owner and his coterie of wealthy colleagues; a luscious born-again Cowboys cheerleader; a veteran Hollywood producer; and supersized pro players eager for a vicarious taste of war. Among these faces Billy sees those of his family—his worried sisters and broken father—and Shroom, the philosophical sergeant who opened Billy's mind and died in his arms at Al-Ansakar.

Over the course of this day, Billy will begin to understand difficult truths about himself, his country, his struggling family, and his brothers-in-arms—soldiers both dead and alive. In the final few hours before returning to Iraq, Billy will drink and brawl, yearn for home and mourn those missing, face a heart-wrenching decision, and discover pure love and a bitter wisdom far beyond his years.

Poignant, riotously funny, and exquisitely heartbreaking, Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk is a devastating portrait of our time, a searing and powerful novel that cements Ben Fountain's reputation as one of the finest writers of his generation.(less)

ebook, 274 pages

Published May 1st 2012 by Ecco (first published January 1st 2012)

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Mar 15, 2013 Kemper rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2013, modern-lit, military, politics, bidness, sports, war, favorites, usa-usa

It’s probably a bad idea for the US military to allow the troops overseas to get the news from back home. I have this fear that someday the service men and women in places like Iraq and Afghanistan will finally snap after seeing the people they’ve pledged to defend are less interested in what they’re doing than TV reality shows and celebrity gossip. If the military ever decides that the pack of assholes back in America isn’t worth fighting and dying for, we could find all that hardware aiming ba...more It’s probably a bad idea for the US military to allow the troops overseas to get the news from back home. I have this fear that someday the service men and women in places like Iraq and Afghanistan will finally snap after seeing the people they’ve pledged to defend are less interested in what they’re doing than TV reality shows and celebrity gossip. If the military ever decides that the pack of assholes back in America isn’t worth fighting and dying for, we could find all that hardware aiming back at us someday. I really wouldn’t blame them.

Billy Lynn is a young soldier who was serving in Iraq with Bravo squad. After Bravo got into a hellacious firefight with a band of insurgents that was captured on camera by an embedded Fox News crew, the members of Bravo become national heroes. To capitalize on their popularity, the Bush administration has Bravo brought back to the US and sent them on a ‘Victory Tour’ (Which just so happens to run through critical electoral states for the next election.) to drum up support for the war.

The Victory Tour culminates at a Thanksgiving Day pro football game at Texas Stadium in which Bravo is supposed to play a part in the half-time show. While Billy and the other Bravo members have been enjoying some of the perks of being heroes on tour, it also means putting up with the people who want to prove their support of the troops by fawning over them as well as being used as PR props by anyone with an agenda like the owner of the Cowboys.* Bravo would also like to sign a film deal before they have to deploy back to Iraq in a few days so they can at least get a nice payday for their efforts, but the producer they’re working with is having problems getting Hollywood interested in a war movie set in Iraq.

(*Ben Fountain avoids a lawsuit by creating a fictional asshole owner of the Cowboys instead of naming Jerry Jones, the actual asshole owner of the Cowboys.)

I started noting passages I wanted to quote in this review, but I hit a point where I was finding something on every page so I gave up on that plan. There was so much about this one that I loved, that I don’t really know where to start.

Young Billy Lynn is one of the best and most sympathetic characters I’ve read in a long while. He’s a 19-year-old virgin who can’t legally drink, but he’s gone to war and had more experience with death than most would have in a lifetime. Billy is nervous when dealing with the older wealthier good old boys who want to glad hand Bravo at the game, and he has a somewhat naive belief that there is someone wiser than him that can explain all the feelings that combat and the aftermath have stirred in him. However, he also has a grunt's hyper-awareness of hypocrisy and bullshit.

As Bravo endures a long day of being used as props for photo ops and a half-time show, Billy’s musings and observations about the people and events in the stadium showcase a society that will spend billions on sports but pays it’s soldiers a pittance while patting themselves on the back for the way they support the troops by offering them applause and trinkets before sending them back to war.

That’s a powerful point, but what makes this so great is that the message is delivered so deftly and without the heavy handed political left or right wing political manifesto that is part of almost any writing done about these kinds of subjects. It’s also funny and absolutely nails many things that are great and ridiculous about America.

It’s only March, but I think I may have an early winner for Best Book I Read This Year.(less)

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Mar 01, 2013 Will Byrnes rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: books-of-the-year-2012

UPDATE - 3/1/13 - at bottom

It is early in the latest Iraq war. SPC Billy Lynn, a 19-year-old, silver-star-recipient and bona fide war hero, is about to be honored at the Dallas Cowboys’ Thanksgiving home game, along with seven other members of Bravo company, for bravery in a battle that had the benefit of a Fox news crew with plenty of film. He is also the window through which we get a hard look at the reality of millennial America. That Ben Fountain succeeds so well in making Billy work both as...more

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Mar 01, 2013 Steve rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It’s an old observation, but true nonetheless: Nineteen is a difficult age – old enough to get shot for your country, but not to drink beer. In Billy Lynn’s case, it’s an age where there’s more than that to sort out, but with little training to draw on to get it all figured. We’re pulling for you, though, Billy.

What SPC William Lynn was trained for was life in Bravo Company, ground troops in Iraq who showed exceptional bravery under fire. Footage of their valor found its way into American living...more It’s an old observation, but true nonetheless: Nineteen is a difficult age – old enough to get shot for your country, but not to drink beer. In Billy Lynn’s case, it’s an age where there’s more than that to sort out, but with little training to draw on to get it all figured. We’re pulling for you, though, Billy.

What SPC William Lynn was trained for was life in Bravo Company, ground troops in Iraq who showed exceptional bravery under fire. Footage of their valor found its way into American living rooms, and for PR reasons these new heroes were given a tour of appreciation back in the States. It culminated at Texas Stadium Thanksgiving Day where the Cowboys were playing the Bears. (Go Bears!) Bravo was invited to participate in the halftime show. Of course, with Destiny’s Child as the musical act, they all wanted to know if they’d get to meet Beyoncé.

The live action takes place the day of the game, starting with the limo ride there (with Billy downing five Jack and Cokes) and ending with the limo picking them up afterwards – next stop: Iraq – again. Flashbacks tell us about their war experiences. We learn more about their victory lap, too, as they were trotted out to various media events including one at the White House. The most significant stop for Billy, though, was to an empty part of Texas. There at home he saw his doting sisters, long-suffering mom, and now disabled, still ornery father. He discovered the medical bills had outpaced his heroism. At surface level, though, the whole tour was a chorus of “We Support Our Troops” and “Thank you for your service.” It was nice to feel appreciated, but it may have rung hollow after awhile. And none of it paid the bills. Nor did it offer reprieves – they all had more war to go. To a man, though, they knew what they’d signed up to do.

At the game, plot lines were shooting in all directions all at once. A movie dealmaker was constantly on his cell trying to get the Bravo story on the silver screen, and money in their pockets. Then there were the texts from one of Billy’s sisters trying to arrange for him to skip out of his return. And let’s not forget Billy’s newfound love, a Cowboys cheerleader with a connection to his hometown. The Cowboys organization was a story in itself from owner Norm (who was as thinly disguised a version of Jerry Jones as Frankenstein would be in a Frankenstein mask) to the players (a subset of whom offered gangsta-style assistance in Iraq for a few days).

Most of the book worked well for me. On the minus side, though, I found writing at times to be a tad overdone. It can be a fine line. Exuberance is tricky. For me, an author with a good ear can even border on purple and still be OK, but other times it’s simply distracting. Here’s an example; judge for yourselves. “It’s just too much for his hangover, all the mounds, slabs, sheets, hummocks, and hillocks of edible matter resembling a complex system of defensive earthworks, and it’s that thing-ness, the sheer molecular density on display, that gives him the lurch.”

Then a few pages later, I think Fountain gets it just about right. Describing the luxury box crowd: “The men have the hale good looks and silver hair of successful bank presidents or midsized-city mayors, tanned, fit sixty-year-olds who can still bring the heat on their tennis serves. Their wives are substantially but not offensively younger, all blondes, all displaying the taut architectonics of surgical self-improvement.”

Other passages show Fountain’s powers of observation. To wit: “Norm is confident, absolutely, he is the king of self-esteem, but this is the confidence of self-help tapes and motivational mantras, confidence learned as one learns a foreign language, and so the accent lingers in his body language, a faint arthritic creak in every smile and gesture.”

Back on the minus side were instances of implausibility. I’ll skip past examples from the plot since I’ve said too much about that already, but will ask if we should believe that a young man can drink beers and highballs (more than a dozen), split a big joint, and still answer interview questions as lucidly as you please? While I’m at it, do moms in Bugtussle, TX really talk like the coolest urbanites in the ice tray? To pile on with one more, there were cases where I felt his stereotypes were a bit too convenient (a notable exception being the born-again Christian with an impetuous moment of passion).

Ah, but I’m being too picky. The bottom line is Billy is great. In a way, he’s an every-grunt, but one that grows very aware. He may not have been a scholar, but he’s smart, and seeking. We can empathize completely as he searches for role models who can give him some wisdom and truth. Shroom had been one, but as Army buddies often do, he met a bad end. I mentioned before that not everything in the story seemed realistic, but it was all very real to Billy. This more than compensates. His feelings in the face of his conflicts seemed genuine and the book succeeds on those grounds; at its best, spectacularly.
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Dec 27, 2012 Khaya rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: audiobooks, situation-not-a-story, maybe-it-s-me

Well, that didn't take very long. Mounting frustration, a couple of critical (if unusual) goodreads reviews, and that's it -- I feel validated now, I'm quitting.

I wanted to blame the audio format, but that doesn't usually get in the way when I'm truly enjoying a book. I could say it's because it's a guy book, but I've liked some guy books in my day -- admittedly they were a harder sell, but not impossible for me to enjoy.

I guess the book just felt repetitive to me. Not much of a plot; rather a s...more Well, that didn't take very long. Mounting frustration, a couple of critical (if unusual) goodreads reviews, and that's it -- I feel validated now, I'm quitting.

I wanted to blame the audio format, but that doesn't usually get in the way when I'm truly enjoying a book. I could say it's because it's a guy book, but I've liked some guy books in my day -- admittedly they were a harder sell, but not impossible for me to enjoy.

I guess the book just felt repetitive to me. Not much of a plot; rather a string of linked events. Every incident was crafted to bring home one or more of the following points:

1. Soldiers in Iraq, and our hero in particular, are really just ordinary 19-year-old boys. But now there's this huge divide between them and the rest of American society.

2. Americans spend a lot of money on stupid things.

3. Americans are naive about the war, about the soldiers' experiences, and about things in general.

4. War is bad.

5. War is really bad.

6. You stupid American civilians just don't get it, do you?

I just got tired of it after a while, along with being hit over the head with the fact that Billy likes masturbating in his room now that he's home. Geez. I got it after one time, do I have to hear about it every time? What artistic purpose is this serving, exactly, what new theme is this highlighting when all of the author's few points are being hammered in repeatedly as it is?

I felt that Billy, rather than being a character I could relate to, conveniently alternated between being a cliche of a teenage guy and an introspective font of private wisdom. And it wasn't as if any of the other characters particularly grabbed me either.

Yes, there were a few well-written sentences. Yes, I guess the topic is arguably a profound one even if I didn't feel the book did it justice. At all. And so many discerning goodreaders whose opinions I truly respect loved this. Raved about it. So don't let my review put you off, because I seem to be very much in the minority. But I felt validated by the few negative reviews out there, so if you're having the same experience as you read my review, then I've done mine.(less)

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Dec 10, 2012 Robert rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Having a somewhat loose connection to the military lifestyle, I felt an instant connection to this book that goes deeper than a cursory glance just across the surface. It made BILLY LYNN’S LONG HALFTIME WALK real to me, yet I did have trouble initially getting into the story, because it’s told as much through flashbacks, bouncing in time from the present to the past, that I struggled initially with the author’s choice of storytelling. But once I caught on, I dove into the water headfirst, and I...more

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Jul 29, 2012 KC rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

A brilliant exploration of the dissonance and disconnect between military life and civilian life in a time of war. I can't recall the last time I've read a novel that skewers the American public so effectively and relentlessly.

This is the right novel for the last ten years of American wars, perhaps THE novel for the War on Terror/GWOT/Long War/whatever the Pentagon is calling it these days. There are several excellent memoirs and non-fictional accounts of life on the modern battlefield ("The Fo...more A brilliant exploration of the dissonance and disconnect between military life and civilian life in a time of war. I can't recall the last time I've read a novel that skewers the American public so effectively and relentlessly.

This is the right novel for the last ten years of American wars, perhaps THE novel for the War on Terror/GWOT/Long War/whatever the Pentagon is calling it these days. There are several excellent memoirs and non-fictional accounts of life on the modern battlefield ("The Forever War," "One Bullet Away," "Joker One," "Generation Kill"), but this novel heads straight for unexplored waters - the patronizing, superficial support of American citizens for their servicemen and the uniformly absurd way they react to a mention of the war or the presence of a soldier. It is a story that could never be fully presented as a work of non-fiction or journalism; every two-bit patriot with a yellow ribbon on a minivan or an American flag in the front yard would be up in arms if they saw this account in a newspaper. No, this is the kind of story that can only be told (at least in these contemporary times) in a work of fiction, and that's what Ben Fountain has done - filled a gaping hole in our understanding of our recent foreign adventures. But at its core, the enemy of the good in this book is not patriotism but the self-serving desire of the public to reduce the war down to something that is simple and easy:

"...and he wonders by what process virtually any discussion about the war seems to profane these ultimate matters of life and death. As if to talk of such things properly we need a mode of speech near the equal of prayer, otherwise just shut, shut your yap and sit on it, silence being truer to the experience than the star-spangled spasm, the bittersweet sob, the redeeming hug, or whatever this fucking closure is that everybody's talking about. They want it to be easy and it's just not going to be."

With evocative descriptions and intervals of absurdist humor, this book careens from the most profound questions of life and death to the most base human desires. At the end of the day, it's not entirely clear whether the protagonists are Billy Lynn and "Bravo" or the American public, and perhaps that's the point - at some point the declaration of patriotism, sympathy, and support becomes less about the troops dying overseas than about the person making the declaration. Negotiating that line is not an easy task, but Ben Fountain has both identified the line and made a compelling case that many of us have crossed it, which gives this novel a relevance that is at once very contemporary but also timeless. There will always be something of a disconnect between those who have seen war and those who have not, but the values of civilian society will determine whether that disconnect becomes a yawning chasm.

Funny, absurd, heartfelt, and provocative.(less)

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May 12, 2012 Adrian White rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

If you saw and enjoyed the compelling TV series Generation Kill, then I think you will love this book. There are many outrageous claims made for the book on the back of the proof copy I read and, I have to say, they all stand up. This is classic literature that will stand the test of time; classic in the sense that it joins a long list of stories about the damage done to young men by a foreign war and the difficulties they face in re-adapting to their homeland. It is also a damning, lacerating d...more

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Feb 11, 2013 Emily rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2013, fiction, literary-fiction-i-actually-like

"THE DALLAS COWBOYS WELCOME HEROS OF AL-ANSAKAR CANAL!!!!!!!" is both a quote from, and a summary of, this literary novel that I loved and admired (keep this in mind the other 95% of the time, when I am petulantly disliking literary fiction).

The entire book, with the exception of one flashback, takes place during a single Super Bowl Sunday afternoon, when the Dallas Cowboys are playing host to eight Army grunts home on a cockeyed sort of "victory tour" after a fire-fight in which Billy's best f...more "THE DALLAS COWBOYS WELCOME HEROS OF AL-ANSAKAR CANAL!!!!!!!" is both a quote from, and a summary of, this literary novel that I loved and admired (keep this in mind the other 95% of the time, when I am petulantly disliking literary fiction).

The entire book, with the exception of one flashback, takes place during a single Super Bowl Sunday afternoon, when the Dallas Cowboys are playing host to eight Army grunts home on a cockeyed sort of "victory tour" after a fire-fight in which Billy's best friend dies in his arms. The "joke"'s on them, though, because this halftime isn't just in a football game; it's their halftime break between two tours in Iraq. None of the citizens lauding them (which turns into a word soup of "nina leven, terrRr, proud, so proud, nina leven, currj") seems to realize the heroes are being stop-lossed back in two days. In the meantime, Billy just wants to meet Beyoncé, and prevent his mother and sisters from freaking out too much about him going back.

The reason I usually don't like literary fiction is that it puts such a premium on style over plot, resulting in writing that's more awkward than revealing. Not so here--the writing sparkles with moments of sharp but simple observation. "Major McLaurin is seated on the rear banquette, watching Dime with all the emotion of a flounder on ice." Billy and his friends goof off a lot, but other scenes juxtapose the sad and the banal. When Billy's waiting for an Army car to pick him up at 7am, ending his visit home: "Denise poured more coffee for him. Kathryn cleared away his plate. The clock on the microwave was two minutes faster than the clock on the stove, which was in turn a minute faster than the wall clock, and every time you looked at one you had to look at the other in a never-ending quest for congruity. It was awful, watching those clocks." And while the book superficially appears to present a 3rd-person version of Billy's stream of consciousness, the football game provides a cunning structure for scenes of hope, fun, and disappointment.

At the center of this novel is a scathing critique of how we treat these supposed heroes compared to the attention and money lavished on other categories of heroes, like professional football players and Destiny's Child; and of how empty our patriotism is when matched against Billy's horrific battlefield experiences and his family's needs. Even if this theme is hidden under a good amount of black humor, a lot of readers find it lacking in subtlety. I would too, except that I think it's true.(less)

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Aug 08, 2012 Michael rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2012, war, contemporary, literary-fiction, satire, sports

Billy Lynn is a 19 year old Texan Iraq War hero on a P.R. tour for the Army. The team “the Bravos” are on a two week “Victory Tour” stateside that were filmed and widely viewed on TV due to acts of valour in Iraq. Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk is a satirical look at Americans and how they treat and view the war on terror.

I’ve often heard that this book is a satirical book in the vein of Slaughterhouse-Five and Catch 22 and this was the primary reason I read this book. While there were some sa...more

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Jan 23, 2013 Danielle McClellan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to Danielle by: Martin McClellan

Shelves: favorites

My absolutely favorite book of the year. I am disappointed that it did not receive the National Book Award, for which it was a finalist. Paul Fussell once said (and this is a fairly loose quote from memory) that it was impossible to speak clearly about war because the true facts of war are so gruesome and ghastly that people will turn from the page in horror unless you use a variety of literary devices to soften the blow.

Ben Fountain has found a dark, funny route into the big conversation and h...more

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Apr 10, 2013 Abby rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

A brilliant novel about war that takes place far from the field of battle at the annual Dallas Cowboys Thanksgiving Day football game, the culmination of a “victory tour” for a squad of young grunts whose heroic actions in Iraq have made them a marketable commodity to drum up support for the war. Hilariously skewers the culture of instant celebrity, politics, patriotism and power, and poignantly conveys the senselessness of sending young men to war.

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Oct 28, 2012 Andrew rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

There's a chapter in All Quiet on the Western Front where the main character returns home on leave to find himself utterly disconnected from his family and society. Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk is a novel-length exploration of the same theme in the context of a Victory Tour for American soldiers from Iraq. Invited to a Thanksgiving NFL game, the men, through the narrator of Billy Lynn, encounter their fellow Americans. Throughout the day's events, soldiers and civilians have a difficult time...more

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Feb 14, 2013 Holly rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2013-reads

This was all momentum - like a movie filmed in one continuous shot (such as De Palma's Snake Eyes) - and in the first third of the novel I was totally there: the language was alive and kinetic and surprising. Then, work got in the way and I just could not read the novel in the ideal one/two sittings. So, when I returned the third, fourth, fifth time I found myself reading the same thoughts and observations and I gradually grew discontented: both Billy's concerns and Bravo company's wandering all...more

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Jan 07, 2013 Jerry rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

A "guy's book" if ever there was one. It's got the war in Iraq, football (specifically, "America's Team",The Dallas Cowboys, drinking and swearing (lots of both), fist fights, weaponry, family dynamics, male friendships and brotherhood, questions about religion, and girl trouble. What more could a man ask for?
Billy Lynn is a Texas boy who finds himself in a bit of trouble at school. As a way out, he is given the option to join the Army. He enlists and finds himself a part of "Bravo Squad" on the...more A "guy's book" if ever there was one. It's got the war in Iraq, football (specifically, "America's Team",The Dallas Cowboys, drinking and swearing (lots of both), fist fights, weaponry, family dynamics, male friendships and brotherhood, questions about religion, and girl trouble. What more could a man ask for?
Billy Lynn is a Texas boy who finds himself in a bit of trouble at school. As a way out, he is given the option to join the Army. He enlists and finds himself a part of "Bravo Squad" on the front lines of the Iraq war. A surprise bloody confrontation is filmed live by a Fox News crew that has been embedded with their unit, and once broadcast, makes heroes of them all, with Billy as the unintentional star. Now Bravo Squad is doing a Victory Tour of the USA to drum up support for the war effort. Along the way the soldiers are asked the same questions ad infinitum and ad nauseum by well-meaning citizens. Their words of encouragement becoming a litany of phrases that are high-lighted in the book like random e.e. cummings poetry: terrRrists -- uhMERicuns -- PAY-tree-uts -- nina leven, and so on... And the question on some lips: Are we really doing any good over there?
The only tour break for the Bravo Squad is when they are allowed to go home for a couple of days to visit family. To nineteen-year-old Billy, this means playing with his little nephew Brian, trying to form a genuine emotional bond with his mother, hanging out with his sisters, and observing his wheelchair-bound and distant father. It seems family members are the only ones who actually DON'T want him to go back to Iraq to finish the last year of his service contract. Everyone else in the community and the country thinks he and his cohorts are doing the right thing.
The final day of their Victory Lap is spent at Texas Stadium being ushered in and out of meetings with rich dignitaries, Texas oil billionaires, area celebrities, and being a part of a spectacle of a half-time show with bands, fireworks, and the music group Destiny's Child featuring the talented Beyoncé . To make things even more urgent for their final day, a Hollywood movie producer is tagging along with their entourage in hopes of selling their story to a studio or production company and making the boys some money for their act of heroism. But who should play the lead? Hilary Swank? Is casting a good star in the role more important than telling the true story? Everyone on the planet has seen the footage already on tv, so why would they make a fictional movie about the incident in the first place? So many questions swirling in young Billy's mind, he doesn't know what to think anymore.
This book has been described as the Catch-22 of our generation, and for good reason. It makes the reader take a good, hard look at fanatical patriotism and questions why we go to war. Religion, relationships, family, friendships, the various medias, and society in general are also under the microscope. Billy Lynn's Long Half-Time Walk is sure to get some conversations started, and maybe that's what the author was trying to do all along. This is Ben Fountain's first novel, and it is a 2012 National Book Award finalist.(less)

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Aug 20, 2012 Jeff Scott rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: iraq-war, war

Ben Fountain’s book analyzes war through a young soldier’s eyes. Billy Lynn, a character that sounds and feels very much like Vonnegut’s Billy Pilgrim, is suddenly thrust into the limelight. Soldiers from his unit are the heroes of the war in Iraq after a televised firefight where Billy played a key role. A victory tour is scheduled culminating in an appearance at the Thanksgiving Day Dallas Cowboys football game half-time show starring Destiny’s Child. Along the way, Billy will meet all sorts o...more Ben Fountain’s book analyzes war through a young soldier’s eyes. Billy Lynn, a character that sounds and feels very much like Vonnegut’s Billy Pilgrim, is suddenly thrust into the limelight. Soldiers from his unit are the heroes of the war in Iraq after a televised firefight where Billy played a key role. A victory tour is scheduled culminating in an appearance at the Thanksgiving Day Dallas Cowboys football game half-time show starring Destiny’s Child. Along the way, Billy will meet all sorts of people big and small and find out what a soldier is worth.

What lies at the heart of the book is the irony of how these soldiers are treated. Billy Lynn has a soldier’s questioning with a lyrical perspective. His moral compass and confident Shroom was killed in the firefight that made him famous. He now must go on the Victory Tour and meet major movers and shakers who want to use his fame for their own purpose. Praised for bravery in the field, but when a soldier returns, there is a minimum wage job waiting for them. These soldiers made everyone proud and everyone wants a piece of them, even wanting to make a movie about them. Yet as the book progresses, they are revealed to be treated as pawns by others, but never will take advantage of it themselves. They are to make others look good and then it is back to Iraq for them.

I picked up this book since I’ve been reading a lot of books about soldiers lately. I’ve read What it is Like to Go to War by Karl Marlantes, The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, and Lethal Warriors by David Phillips. It’s the last book that brought me to Billy Lynn. I felt that Fountain really captures how a soldier feels coming back from the war. It’s like they are an alien no one can possibly understand. Just like Shakespeare’s Coriolanus, soldiers can often have more connection with fellow soldiers and even enemy soldiers than homeland civilians. This book seems to emphasize that point. It’s a wonderful portrayal of alienation.

Favorite Lines:

“All the fakeness just rolls right off them, maybe because the nonstop sales job of American life has instilled in them exceptionally high thresholds for sham, puff, spin, bullshit, and outright lies, in other words advertising in all its forms. Billy himself never noticed how fake it all is until he’d done time in a combat zone.” P. 131
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Oct 21, 2012 Daniel rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: literary-fiction, satire

An embedded Fox News team in Iraq captures battle footage that goes viral in America, making heroes of SPC Billy Lynn the remaining men of Bravo Company, second platoon, first squad (which is shortened to the meaningless "Bravo squad" by the Fox embed). These eight men are pulled out of Iraq as part of a morale-boosting Victory Tour, and we meet them in Dallas on the last leg of their cross-country trip. In addition to being fêted at the Dallas Cowboys game, they are also accompanied by a movie...more

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Jul 13, 2012 Stuart rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: more-stuff-like-this-please

I can't say that I've ever read a Texas stream of consciousness novel before. It's a bit like taking Leopold Bloom and transplanting him to Dallas. Billy Lynn isn't like Bloom, though; he isn't a Dublin do-nothing who gets a buzz out of seeing a girl's ankles. Instead, he's an Iraq War hero on a p.r. tour for the Army and the day in question isn't June 16 (I'm three days late with this review). It's Thanksgiving Day at a Dallas Cowboys football game and Lynn gets a rise out of the ample flesh of...more

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Feb 18, 2013 John Sherman rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

A great book. This is modern literary writing at it's best - thought provoking, yet accessible; entertaining, yet challenging. The story follows a group of young war heroes being honored at a Dallas Cowboys' half time show. They are greeted warmly / passionately by most everyone they encounter, but as they meet more and more patriotic supporters of the war, the protagonist begins to question what actually constitutes patriotism and what exactly he is fighting for. Additionally, the author artist...more

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May 24, 2012 Barbara rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

It’s Thanksgiving Day and halftime for nineteen-year-old Billy Lynn’s tour of duty in Iraq. Billy and his fellow Bravos are on a two week “Victory Tour” stateside due to acts of valor in Iraq that were filmed and widely viewed on TV and online. The Bravos are heroes and everyone wants to bask in their glory. Hillary Swank is interested in portraying either Billy or his sergeant in a Hollywood film version. Dubya greets them in the White House before their other scheduled stops in swing states. T...more It’s Thanksgiving Day and halftime for nineteen-year-old Billy Lynn’s tour of duty in Iraq. Billy and his fellow Bravos are on a two week “Victory Tour” stateside due to acts of valor in Iraq that were filmed and widely viewed on TV and online. The Bravos are heroes and everyone wants to bask in their glory. Hillary Swank is interested in portraying either Billy or his sergeant in a Hollywood film version. Dubya greets them in the White House before their other scheduled stops in swing states. Two days before the Bravos are due to return to Iraq to finish their tour of duty, they are feted by America’s team in Dallas, home to the Cowboys football franchise, and are expected to share star billing during the halftime show with Destiny’s Child.

That’s the setup. The payoff is Fountain’s exquisite sense of irony. We see Billy and his fellow soldiers, grunts paid about $15,000 a year for their part in the War Against Terror juxtaposed against professional football players who make millions for entertainment purposes. The NFLers want to know what it’s like to cap someone and volunteer to help out for a while but recoil from the idea of enlisting because “this here our job, how you think we gonna quit our job go join some nigga’s army? Fah like, wha, three years? Break our contract and all?” The Cowboys owner is a mixture of righteousness and ruthlessness. His speech on the perils of Saddam Hussein sounds suspiciously like more domestic villains: “A man . . . who built palaces for his personal pleasure while schools decayed and his country’s health care system collapsed. Who maintained one of the world’s most expensive armies while he allowed his nation’s infrastructure to crumble. Who channeled resources to his cronies and political allies allowing them to siphon off much of the country’s wealth for their own personal gain.” And, oh! The cheerleaders! Billy falls hard for Faison, beautiful (even in pancake makeup), soft, and sweet smelling. With her amber colored hair, she reminded me of the woman in John Prine’s Great Compromise :

I knew a girl who was almost a lady
She had a way with all the men in her life
Every inch of her blossomed in beauty
And she was born on the fourth of July

Billy comes to see that the homeland dream is what matters most to Americans, even as it overwhelms his personal reality of war. The homeland dream is the dominant reality. Billy loves, hopes, yearns, and finally accepts. America needs heroes and ideals of heroism, just at a safe distance.

This is a brilliant book.

(less)

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Aug 12, 2012 Eestescol rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk by Ben Fountain
When a reviewer declares that Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk, “is as close to the Great American Novel as anyone is likely to come these days,” I am leery. Not that I don’t trust the reviewer (author Madison Smartt Bell), but GREAT AMERICAN NOVEL isn’t a big selling point for me.
(My hesitation is undoubtedly a holdover from bad summer reading lists, which were stuffed with GREAT AMERICAN NOVELS that were anything but. )
Despite the unfortunate cate...more

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Jul 18, 2012 Sarah rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Stupendous instant classic, on innocence, ignorance and experience. Basically it's one long riff of consciousness from Billy, home from Iraq (temporarily) on a victory tour, and being treated to a barrage of experience that shows the war as business, as movie-making, as a sporting event, and set as it is at a Cowboys game on Thanksgiving, it could hardly be more perfectly contrived.

His reality is their reality's bitch; what they don't know is more powerful that all the things he knows, and yet h

...more

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May 15, 2012 John Luiz rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I was a huge fan of Ben Fountain's short story collection Brief Encounters With Che Guevara, so I was eagerly anticipating his first novel. The novel focuses on one of the author's favorite themes - innocents serving as the pawns for power players in the world of politics. Here the focus in on Billy Lynn, a 19-year-old soldier who, along with his fellow soldiers in the Bravo squadron, becomes a hero in the Iraq War. Because their battle with Iraqi insurgents was captured on film and shown repeat...more I was a huge fan of Ben Fountain's short story collection Brief Encounters With Che Guevara, so I was eagerly anticipating his first novel. The novel focuses on one of the author's favorite themes - innocents serving as the pawns for power players in the world of politics. Here the focus in on Billy Lynn, a 19-year-old soldier who, along with his fellow soldiers in the Bravo squadron, becomes a hero in the Iraq War. Because their battle with Iraqi insurgents was captured on film and shown repeatedly on Fox TV, they become celebrities for people trying to justify a questionable war. They come home to the United States for a two-week Victory Tour, and the novel occurs entirely on the final day of the tour when they are the showcased guests at a Dallas Cowboys football game against the Chicago Bears. Fountain is an immensely gifted writer. The writing on every page is dazzling, and his gift at description, character building and lyricism are so jaw-droppingly good I found myself highlighting section after section until I stopped because I would have highlighted the whole book.

My quibbles with the book are that from the outset you don't have a clear sense of some big thing that Billy wants, and there's no clear adversary preventing him from getting it - and without those definite desires and obstacles to them, it's not the kind of book you can't wait to get back to, as you're reading, to see if the character will be able to find a way to reach his goals. The Bravo soldiers will have to go back to the war, and while Billy's sister begs him not to and tries to introduce him to people who could spirit him away, it isn't until the end of the book that Billy starts to give that option any serious consideration. For much of the book he seems to accept his return as a given.

The one dream the Bravo soliders collectively have is to make a lot of money from a movie made about their exploits because a Hollywood producer has bought the rights to their lives. That producer, Albert, tags along throughout their day at the football game, but at least through the early part of the book he becomes a tad obnoxious and repetitive as he keeps squawking into his cell phone with all the pompous, over-the-top insincerity masked as brutal honesty that has been portrayed so many times before in books, movies and TV shows like Entourage. The one funny bit here is that the movie deal starts to get some traction when Hillary Swank becomes interested in the story, on the condition that Billy's character become a female hero for the film, but the references to Swank's interest get so repetitive they do start to border on the monotonous. The only real adversary here - and a very thin one - is Norm Ogelsby, the team owner, who's an imitation of the real egomaniac, Jerry Jones, the owner of the Cowboys. But the real tension with him doesn't come until the end of the book when he becomes interested in starting a film company to make the movie himself and becomes a hard-nosed negotiator with Albert and the soldiers. Of course, the main adversary here, would be the Bush Administration for intiating a war on the false pretense of getting rid of Saddam's WMDs, but those adversaries loom far in the background here.

The other want Billy has is a relationship with one of the Cowboy cheerleaders, who makes out with him in a hidden corner during a photo shoot with the soldiers. Billy is a virgin, and his instant attraction to an immature cheerleader, is nothing more than the most obvious dreamy, boyhood urge. What the novel does very well is show what little interest people have in actually getting to know the soldiers, while they're fawning all over them, telling them they are heroes and expressing gratitude for their service. It's interesting that the soldiers are trying to get a movie made about themselves because for the hordes of people they meet - the powerful, the famous, and the everyday folk - what the soldiers mostly serve as is a blank screen upon which people can project all their own feelings about the war and how the United States should be exacting revenge in the aftermath of 9/11. One of the best and funniest scenes occurs in a pre-game exchange with the Cowboys' secondary. When the soldiers visit the locker room, most of the players stare off blankly, blocking out the routine interruptions in their pre-game rituals. But the defensive backs draw Billy in, eager for details of what guns Billy uses and taking sadistic pleasure in hearing gory details of his battles, as they entertain fantasies of joining up with the soldiers for a two-week tour in which they could wreak some havoc without having to leave their high-paying jobs permanently.

The soldiers know they're being used by the government as a propaganda machine, and they're just interested in making some money off the entire P.R. operation. The way that Fountain so effectively portrays the sarcastic, ball-busting, but I've got your back camaraderie of the soldiers is one of the highlights of the book. I do wish we'd had a clearer description of the battle that made the soldiers famous, but a description of what happened is delayed in the early portion of the book, and when it comes later, it's often in bits and pieces. But there is a very powerful description of the one fatality of that fight dying in Billy's arms and the impact that has on Billy's thought patterns.

I feel a little silly offering so many critiques of a book that's full of so many brilliant sentences, descriptions and observations. Just one section -- the prolonged description of the tour the soldiers get of the equipment room by the equipment handler - could serve as a showcase of how prodigiously talented Fountain is. The catalogue of the endless variety of gear the team requires is so eye-opening and so humorously told, you can't believe that a writer could make that subject so fascinating.

I just wish I could have along the way rooted along with Billy for something bigger than getting money from a smarmy movie producer or a sexual romp with a drop-dread gorgeous cheerleader. And while the prospect of death hangs over Billy constantly as he contemplates returning to Iraq, the brutality of that war only comes through in a few brief passages, such as the death scene noted above and another in which Billy recalls the horror of what happens to the human body when it's shot at in close range with a high-powered weapon. In conclusion, I suppose, it was a book I did enjoy and I still look forward to Fountain's next work, but I think he fell short of making this a classic on the level of Catch 22, to which I know it has been compared.(If Billy had an urge as compelling as Yossarian's desire to avoid another combat mission, and as worthy an adversary as the crazy bureaucracy that blocked Y from his goal, this book might have had the same impact for me as that classic.) Another current novel in this vein of comic/satirical (with touches of tragedy) looks at the plight of Iraqi soldiers is Last One In by Nicholas Kulish, which didn't get the attention it deserved. It too offers a great look at the war from the perspective of the foot soldiers. (less)

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Feb 04, 2012 Emily Crowe rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I'd say that the first 3/4 of this book feels constantly fresh and somewhat edgy and it was all I could do to keep myself from tearing through the pages. The last bit bogged down a bit for me, though.

That being said, I feel that this may be an important book. So far it's the only one I've read coming out of the Irag War that subsumes itself in neither action sequences nor in an overwrought family drama. This one seems to be just as much about the war itself as the politics behind it and how Amer...more

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Feb 13, 2012 Nicole Perez rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It's not easy to put yourself in the shoes of a soldier who has been through a serious firefight. Billy Lynn is a fictional character but he could be any real life hero who's come home and put in the spotlight. Billy struggles with the attention - which includes a trip to watch the Dallas Cowboys on Thanksgiving Day (that's kind of a big deal to a Texan). Billy and his fellow soldiers are humans trained to fight. I enjoyed their REALLY long day, but felt sad when I finished this. These brave men...more

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Dec 08, 2012 Brian rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shades of Catch-22. Funny, poignant, and above all, rather thoughtful. Fountain's style borders between that of serious literature and the immaturity of young men put in a situation that challenges their every thought; it's an impressive thing to read even if it takes a while to get acclimated to it. Also, Fountain spends the entire novel centering on one day--Thanksgiving Day at Cowboy Stadium--and 200+ pages pass before the football game even begins. Before reading, I would've thought such a t...more

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May 17, 2013 Shannon rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It's rare for me to read and book and feel like I am reading a classic in the making. But that's exactly what I think Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk is - a book destined to be a classic, perhaps even destined to be the seminal look at the Iraq war and its impact on the modern psyche.

Billy Lynn is an average guy who joins the military somewhat under duress - and is promptly sent to Iraq. We meet Billy when he's home for a victory tour following a firefight with insurgents that was captured on fi...more It's rare for me to read and book and feel like I am reading a classic in the making. But that's exactly what I think Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk is - a book destined to be a classic, perhaps even destined to be the seminal look at the Iraq war and its impact on the modern psyche.

Billy Lynn is an average guy who joins the military somewhat under duress - and is promptly sent to Iraq. We meet Billy when he's home for a victory tour following a firefight with insurgents that was captured on film and promptly broadcast to show US firepower and victory. Billy is a hero who doesn't feel like one. He's a soldier whose training took over in a moment of crisis and kept him alive. He's a 19 year old who feels conflicted about duty to country and duty to family.

In some ways, Ben Fountain's writing reminds me of Markus Zusak's in The Book Thief, though the two books are quite different. But Fountain plays around with words and language in a way that serves the storyline and helps the reader feel a disorientation akin to the one Billy feels throughout.

This book is not a light read. (How could a book about this topic be light?) And it was especially hard to read while my brother is deployed in Afghanistan. But it was a book that gave me great compassion for the strength of character and the suppression of emotion required to fight for our country. It left me feeling conflicted about the things we (perhaps unknowingly) ask of men who are fresh from the gates of boyhood. And while the book doesn't take us there, I wonder what Billy Lynn's life will be like if he manages to make it back home alive. How does one move forward?

If you're interested in taking a step away from present day events and seeing recent history through a literary lens of truth, I highly recommend Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk. It may take you a while to get into it but I doubt you will finish it unmoved. By the end, I was half in love with Billy's unique mix of sincerity, innocence and valor. You might be, too.(less)

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May 15, 2013 Paul rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I definitely enjoyed the book, and read it quickly - it was a fast read. I had hopes for the protagonist Billy Lynn, some of which were fulfilled, some of which were not. If nothing else though, he and Sergeant Dime had plenty of useful thoughts to share, thoughts worth reading and considering. You can find a great many quotes scattered around.

One idea which struck me occurred when Billy is examining the pain of leaving home, and thinks "just get through it". I was left to consider just how muc...more

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May 11, 2013 Meredith Watts rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I fell extravagantly in love with Billy Lynn, the accidental hero of this pitch-perfect book. Billy ends up in the Army due to some misbehavior. School was a complete bore for him, and he was going nowhere. But a year in Iraq made him a new man. He found a spiritual guide in one Sergeant who gave him books to read, and a father figure in another. His extraordinary acts of bravery won him a Silver Star, and his Bravo squad is finishing up a "victory tour" around the country during the second of G...more

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May 03, 2013 Aban (Aby) rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

In a Goodreads interview, Kate Atkinson (whose writing I really appreciate) stated that this book was her favourite novel of 2013, so I made a note of it. During the first chapter or so, my heart sank as I was not interested in reading about a nineteen year old whose chief interests seemed to be sex and drinking. (Normal, perhaps for teens and young adults but certainly not my priorities in life!) However, thanks to Atkinson's recommendation, I carried on reading and how glad I am that I did! By...more

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Apr 27, 2013 Judith rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

A finalist for the National Book Award, this book is superb! I recommend it to everyone I know. I didn't want to put it down, so when I finished, I started again and reread the whole book. The only thing I didn't care for is the title, which I think lacks the dignity the book deserves. But that is a small point.

Billy Lynn is a young army soldier during the Iraq war, and happens to perform bravely under fire at a moment in time when Fox news was filming. As a result, he and his fellow soldiers a...more A finalist for the National Book Award, this book is superb! I recommend it to everyone I know. I didn't want to put it down, so when I finished, I started again and reread the whole book. The only thing I didn't care for is the title, which I think lacks the dignity the book deserves. But that is a small point.

Billy Lynn is a young army soldier during the Iraq war, and happens to perform bravely under fire at a moment in time when Fox news was filming. As a result, he and his fellow soldiers are given medals and get to come home for a two week "victory" tour before heading back directly into the fray. The story centers on their last leg of the trip which is on Thanksgiving day at the Dallas Cowboy's stadium where the Cowboys are playing against the Chicago Bears. The eight soldiers are scheduled to meet the players, the cheerleaders, the owners, and (they hope) Beyonce who is performing at the half-time. As the day goes on, Billy thinks back to the battle scene as well as the day he was allowed to spend with his family.

Billy is heartbreakingly young and naive, and at the same time has experienced almost a condensed version of a whole lifetime because of the war. "Life in the Army has been a crash course in the scale of the world, which is such that he finds himself in a constant state of wonder as to how things come to be. Stadiums, for example. Airports. The interstate highway system. Wars. He wants to know how it is paid for, where do the billions come from? . . .but how you enter that world he has no idea except by passage through that other foreign country called college, and that ain't happening. He will not return to the classroom ever. . .If there is any real knowledge to be had in the Texas public schools he never found it, and only lately has he started to feel the loss, the huge criminal act of his state-sanctioned ignorance as he struggles to understand the wider world."

The education system failed him so he ended up joining the army, so that his country could screw him a second time by sending him off to die in a desert. The book does a fabulous job of satirizing the contrast between the grunts and the citizens who are superfluous in their support of the troops while ensuring their own aren't involved. In this scene the owner of the Cowboys observes the boys goofing around and thinks: "What cards these Bravos are, what a grab-ass band of brothers. Okay, so maybe they aren't the greatest generation by anyone's standards, but they are surely the best of the bottom third percentile of their own somewhat muddled and suspect generation."

I loved this book and I could go on all day, but don't read the reviews---read the book. It's great. (less)

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An Iraq veteran's response to Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk	26	175	Apr 18, 2013 05:31am
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21st Century Lite...: Billy Lynn... — Halftime Show	3	17	Nov 15, 2012 02:04am
21st Century Lite...: Billy Lynn... — Fourth Quarter and postgame discussion	5	28	Nov 11, 2012 10:42am
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About Ben Fountain

Ben Fountain's fiction has appeared in Harper's, The Paris Review, and Zoetrope: All Story, and he has been awarded an O. Henry Prize, two Pushcart Prizes, and the PEN/Hemingway Award. He lives with his wife and their two children in Dallas, Texas.

More about Ben Fountain...

Books by Ben Fountain

Brief Encounters with Che Guevara: Stories

The Book of Dads: Essays on the Joys, Perils, and Humiliations of Fatherhood

The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror 2007: Twentieth Annual Collection

The Ecco Anthology of Contemporary American Short Fiction

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“All the fakeness just rolls right off them, maybe because the nonstop sales job of American life has instilled in them exceptionally high thresholds for sham, puff, spin, bullshit, and outright lies, in other words for advertising in all its forms.” — 6 people liked it

“Okay, so maybe they aren't the greatest generation by anyone's standard, but they are surely the best of the bottom third percentile of their own somewhat muddled and suspect generation.” — 6 people liked it

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