Catch-22 is a darkly comic anti-war novel that follows Captain John Yossarian, a U.S. Army bombardier during World War II, as he desperately tries to escape the madness and bureaucracy of military life. Trapped by the paradoxical logic of “Catch-22”—which states that trying to avoid combat missions proves one is sane, but asking to be grounded is evidence of insanity—Yossarian finds himself in an endless cycle of absurdity, fear, and frustration. Through satire and surreal humor, Joseph Heller exposes the cruelty, contradiction, and futility of war and institutional logic.