The perspective of the book, The Greatest Generation, is the perspective of the author, Tom Brokaw. Brokaw became interested in the World War II generation when he was making a documentary on the fortieth anniversary of the D-Day invasion. He was in Normandy. The project, he says, was just another assignment to him until he began talking to some of the veterans and hearing the stories they had to tell of the war and their lives. Brokaw realized that this generation affected not only him but also the whole country.