The Things They Carried is a collection of linked short stories by American novelist Tim O’Brien, about a platoon of American soldiers in the Vietnam War. His third book about the war, it is based upon his experiences as a soldier in the 23rd Infantry Division. O’Brien prefers to refrain from political debate and discourse regarding the Vietnam War, but has become jaded regarding the ignorance he perceives from the denizens of his home town toward the world. The book works heavily with metafiction, employing a writing tactic called verisimilitude. The use of real names and inclusion of himself as the protagonist within the book creates a style that meshes and blurs the fiction and non-fiction. The Things They Carried is dedicated to the fictional men of the Alpha Company in order to make the novel feel like a war memoir.