Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption

An Army Air Forces bomber vanished into the Pacific Ocean on a May day in 1943, leaving behind just a spray of wreckage and a slick of blood, fuel, and oil. Then a face materialized on the ocean's surface. It was the image of a young lieutenant, the bombardier of the jet, straining to get into a life raft. Thus began one of the most remarkable journeys of the Second World War.

Louis Zamperini was the lieutenant. He had been a crafty and uncontrollable miscreant when he was younger, stealing from homes, fighting, and running away to live on the trains. He had turned his youthful disobedience into a great ability for running, which had taken him to the Olympics in Berlin and almost to the four-minute mile. However, when the war came, the athlete had turned into an airman and set off on a trip that would take him to a little raft, his tragic flight, and an uncertain future.

Thousands of miles of open ocean, jumping sharks, a capsized raft, hunger and thirst, enemy planes, and an even more difficult task awaited Zamperini. When Zamperini was pushed to the beyond of his endurance, he would respond to cruelty with defiance, misery with humor, optimism, and determination, and despair with inventiveness. Either catastrophe or victory, his destiny would hang precariously on the brittle thread of his will.