'The slightest story ought to contain the facts about money'
             'The Things They Carried', Tim O'Brien's collection of vignettes centred on the Vietnam war is far from a slight story but it does contain many facts about blood which help to maintain our interest. O'Brien focuses on one of the bloodiest conflicts in twentieth century history in order to show us the horror experienced by the often young and naive soldiers, the post war trauma they faced at home and, ultimately, he muses on the very nature of how we live when those around us die. He expands the mere idea of blood to encompass war and violence but also the beauty of being with people one can really learn to bond with. Blood, then, is seen in its worst and most frightening form, but also as in blood ties; the love and affection we may feel for others when placed in extreme circumstances. It is the depth of blood as O'Brien sees it which ensures reader interest until the end of this complex novel.
             Blood features heavily in a number of the vignettes. In 'On the Rainy River' O'Brien clearly uses the blood of the pigs in the slaughter house as a metaphor for the blood the persona is later to see and to shed in Vietnam. The metaphor is almost clumsy but is effective as we recoil from his description of blasting the blood clots out of the animal bodies: "As a carcass passed by, you'd lean forward and swing the gun up against the clots and squeeze the trigger...and you'd hear a quick splattering sound as the clots dissolved into a fine red mist. It was not pleasant work." O'Brien focuses on the smell of the pigs and we cannot help but associate this with the smell of war as he describes it elsewhere in the novel.
             Blood, then, is shed in Vietnam. O'Brien comments on the deaths of Lavender, Lemon, Kiowa and Strunk. Our expectation after 'On the Rainy River' is that these stories will focus on t...