Book 2

In book Two Joe wants to make contact with the outside world more than anything else. Using his head to transfer Morse code he is finally able to make contact with the world outside his dark prison. He tells the man that finally comes to listen to his messages that he wants to be taken out of the hospital and toured around the countryside. He wants to show those with romantic words and images in their heads the terrible truth of war. There is not fun there. All you find is a maimed husk of a man who will never be able to experience the world around him ever again. However, the army won’t let him of the hospital because of the very thing he wants to show. They have no desire for the world at large to get such a close glimpse of the true horror of war. If boys looking on see how terrible the grand adventure of war really is, the leaders of the army will never be able to recruit anyone again.

How injured is Joe? How much does it matter?

Joe is extremely injured. He has lost both his arms, both his legs, and a large chunk of his face. He can no longer see, hear, smell, or taste. He’s basically a torso and a brain. Joe is fed and breathes through a series of tubes. The extent of his injuries is critical to the book’s plot. Because Joe has absolutely no access to the world around him beyond the vibrations he feels as people walk by his bed. This puts him in a position that no one else can experience, and the realizations that he makes are unique to his unique situation. If he had even one more of the senses that people these days take for granted, His experience wouldn’t have been the same. From the struggle to find out the time of day, to the deep reflections about himself, all would have be different on the most basic level if he had been able to see or hear.