Dystopian Novel "American War" by Omar El Akkad

American War , a dystopian novel, by Omar El Akkad shares a story of Sarat Chestnut and her family as they experience a civil war first hand. Throughout the years when war takes place in this devasted America it shows the reality of the problems in the present international 65world through the eyes of the American people, creating a sense of realism to its readers. The overarching aspect of the novel is manipulation and destruction, as Sarat is stripped of her normal life and forced to grow up in a country that only knows war.

In American War, Akkad writes about the Second Civil War that takes place in 2074 and drags on until 2095. Within the novel, there are many problems put forth that do not directly affect America, as well as other that may never take place. Topics of contention in the novel include tragic events like the camps that the war refugees live in, “the great massacre” at Camp Patience, and the death of Dana Chestnut, Sarat’s sister.

When speaking about the book, Akkad mentioned in a lecture that America is used as a table and that the actual problems that are taking place in Afghanistan is being used as a tablecloth to bring the problems into relation with the American people. This helps to bring to light and domesticate the problems for the American people, because we are raised to only see what affects our country and anything terrible that happens in other countries is often kept out of our daily news.

Get quality help now

Writer Lyla

Verified

Proficient in: Novels

5 (876)

“ Have been using her for a while and please believe when I tell you, she never fail. Thanks Writer Lyla you are indeed awesome ”

+84 relevant experts are online

Hire writer

The families that live at Camp Patience are not living in the best conditions. A boy from Alabama named Marcus Exum is introduced in chapter five, he states “My dad says anyone who stays [at Camp Patience] more than a month is gonna die here,” this implies that the living conditions are bad enough that they would either die from something at the camp or they would be killed. At this point in the book it is “July 2081,” and Sarat and her family have been living at the refugee camp for “six years.” The living condition of these refugee camps relate to the present day camps that one may find the Syrian Refugees living in, along with the NATO commands that are living in a FOB (Forward Operating Base) in tents and are constantly surrounded by enemy fire and dust. From an American perspective, anyone living in the United States does not hear about the living conditions of those affected by war in Afghanistan as well as in other countries.

When the massacre arrived at Camp Patience, nobody is expecting the militia to appear at the “northern gate.” Sarat is out by the gate when they began to break through it. She then runs back to her family’s tent to try to find her mother, Martina, her twin sister, Dana, and her brother, Simon, but only Dana is there. “The gunfire echoed” as Dana and Sarat runs through Camp Patience to escape the militia. As the terror continues throughout the night, Sarat leaves Dana’s side momentarily while she sleeps to try to find their mom and Simon. As she sneaks her way through the camp she finds the body of “Eli, the Virginia Cavalier,” and she realizes she is surrounded by boys of the “rebels from her [brother Simon’s] clan.” While witnessing this, Sarat loses all confidence she had to find her mother and her brother. This implies that Sarat was using the courage of knowing her brother was alive to push her to continue but when she found the clan dead it disappeared.

As she stands there, she begins to hear the militia heading toward her and “shook her from her paralysis,” (Akkad, 202) she drops into the pile of dead bodies to hide from the men. Sarat runs into a tent when she has a chance and finds “Sabrina, a refugee from Mississippi,” she is beaten and bloody, Sarat sits with Sabrina until her last breath. Sarat has still not found her mother and Simon; the next morning the “Free Southerners arrived,” and Sarat went back up to find Dana and take her down to the courtyard, Dana cries at the result of the massacre, but Sarat is almost numb to the pain. Sarat sends Dana on the bus and begins her search for their mom and Simon, she never finds their bodies. The massacre also symbolizes present day separation of families, whether it be because of the war, military, or deportation.

The third topic that creates a sense of realism is the use of technological warfare. Sarat’s twin sister, Dana, is killed by a drone airstrike or what they call ‘The Birds.” Sarat rushes to see her sister in the hospital as she cannot believe this had happened. The reason that this event creates so much realism for the book’s audience is because the advantages of technology that the world has nowadays. This is another place where the table and tablecloth analogy made by Akkad in his lecture comes into play, because we can use technology against one another to threaten and ruin the lives of people all over the world. This does not happen in America, and that is why it is such a huge deal in the book. It is another daily tragedy that is experienced by those in Afghanistan, and other war zones.

American War has a complex theme that can be interpreted by individuals that read the book. The implied theme is manipulation and destruction, this is shown from the beginning to the end where destruction and manipulation is shown once the Chestnuts arrive at Camp Patience and onward. When Benjamin is speaking in the prologue he talks about how “this isn’t a story about war. It’s about ruin,” this theme is shown throughout the book, with Sarat’s father dying early on. Sarat is manipulated from a young age due to her vulnerability, a factor of this might be that her father was killed by a “homicide bomb” when she was only six years old and her mother lied and told her he was up north, alive and well. Soon after his death she is ripped away from her home in Louisiana just for the “violence [that] never inched any further into Louisiana.” Her best friend Marcus leaves suddenly days before the massacre that kills Sarat’s mother and permanently injures her brother, and the book ends with lines from Sarat’s diary that her nephew Benjamin found saying “I was young, I lived with my parents. . . I was happy then.”

The theme of destruction goes with the redeeming moral message that war ruins people, one might look at Sarat and say that she is not ruined. Their reasoning behind that may be because in the end it is Sarat who makes these rash decisions, but some of her worst decisions come after she meets Albert Gaines, who makes her the “monster” she becomes. After the massacre takes place and she kills a northern soldier in cold blood, she goes to Gaines and says, “I want to kill them.” From that line on Sarat follows Gaines’ lead when it comes to the war, and then later when Joe comes to visit her after she is out a prison he tells her “…it’s a sickness…[n]obody going on this trip is coming back.” Sarat takes a plague up to the North and it is just another step of manipulation in her life. Joe calls it revenge for what the people did to Sarat while she was in prison.

America War, is not only a novel about ruin but has a heavy theme of manipulation and destruction, as the reader travels through Sarat’s difficult life. Omar El Akkad is able to connect his American readers to this futuristic America that relates directly to problems happening in present day Afghanistan and other places that the War on Terror is affecting. Whether it be the separation of families, the advantages of technological warfare ranging from drones to weapons of direct fire capabilities, and how easily war can change someone’s life. Not only does this novel create a strong sense of realism, it also holds a powerful moral message that the path to peace is harder than the path of vengeance.