Considered by many to be the finest novel of the Vietnam War, Tim O'Brien's Going after Cacciato (1978) is a multilayered story that encloses the war within a theme exploring fact and fiction, the real and imagined. In Vietnam, reality as experienced by the soldier or civilian lacked order, clarity, and purpose. O'Brien's novel operates on the assumption that only an act of the imagination could create meaning out of the chaos of the war. Interwoven within its texture are three narrative strands, combining to surround the major theme. The first of these is the story of a squad's search for one of its members, Cacciato, who has deserted with the announced intention of walking to Paris, some 8,600 miles from the battle scene. The second is the series of powerful and haunting battle scenes the squad participates in. The last is the Observation Post monologues, in which the authorial voice enters the story. Throughout the novel, the laws of chronology are consistently violated; eventually the reader's clearest guide to when a particular event occurs comes from knowing which of the squad members are dead at that time. The novel opens with a litany of the dead:

It was a bad time. Billy Boy Watkins was dead and so was Frenchie Tucker. Billy Boy had died of fright, scared to death on the field of battle, and Frenchie Tucker had been shot through the nose. Bernie Lynn and Lieutenant Sidney Martin had died in tunnels. Pederson was dead and Rudy Chassler was dead. Buff was dead. Ready Mix was dead. They were all among the dead.

The deaths of these soldiers will be described later in the novel, along with those of other squad members. These scenes and the pursuit of Cacciato are seen through the imagination and consciousness of a squad member, Paul Berlin, who is as divided within himself as the city whose name he bears. Berlin wrestles with his fear, not only of dying, but of dying like Billy Boy, of fear. In searching for Cacciato, he is really looking within himself. As the pursuit becomes more and more an act of Berlin's imagination, it inspires and is inspired by his recollections of the deaths in battle he has witnessed. Recovering these recollections, many of which he had suppressed, enables Berlin to come to terms with his fear and his guilt. The chief source of guilt stems from his participation in the squad's murder of its lieutenant, Sidney Martin. The only squad member who had refused to acquiesce in the murder was Cacciato. This raises another question for Paul: Does he have the courage to desert, to "go after Cacciato," in the sense of following in his footsteps?

At the conclusion of the novel, it is clear that the trek to Paris that absorbs much of the book has been imaginary. After an initial attempt to capture Cacciato, the squad had, in fact, returned to its duties. The rest has been imagined by Paul, but, precisely for that reason, it has shaped and reformed Paul into a soldier who understands himself and what his experiences in the war have taught him: He is not free enough to be a deserter, like Cacciato; he is bound to the other members of his squad in a relationship of mutual responsibility. He could never have achieved that understanding without imagining the pursuit of Cacciato. In his mind he has transformed the chaos of war and the fear of death into an act of self-recognition.

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