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Newtown: An American Tragedy (2013)

by Matthew Lysiak(Favorite Author)

3.74 of 5 Votes: 5

ISBN

1476753768 (ISBN13: 9781476753768)

languge

English

genre

History & Biography

publisher

Gallery Books

review 1: I was and still am so horrified, sickened, and saddened by this. I still think of those kids almost daily, and I still feel it's incomprehensible that such evil can exist in the same world as a God. Like many other people, when I heard the killer's mother taught him all about guns and often took him target shooting as a way of bonding, I wondered what kind of mother would cultivate this hobby in her mentally ill son. This book did shed some light on how she was so desperate to connect with him, and given how bad his mental illness was, she gratefully latched on to something that interested him and that she felt would teach him discipline. The book does show that she had her flaws as well, so she is not simply painted as an innocent victim. It also gives some detail on what... more the killer's life was like growing up so markedly different than his peers. Although it is no excuse, this book does show how his whole life was pretty miserable. For me, this book went a little ways toward answering the question, "How could this happen?" These kids andnteachers deserve to be commemorated and remembered, so it's good to read about them and know what they were like so they are not simply remembered as victims of one man's mental illness. Be warned that this is a heartbreaking read; there is no other way to read it than in small doses, putting it down when the tears come and trying to come back to it later when one is more composed.
review 2: It goes without saying, but this is a profoundly unsettling book. Lysiak does an admirable job navigating a story that is fraught with difficulty. He does his best to honor the lives of the victims by reflecting on their mornings leading up to the tragedy, and later shares pieces of their eulogies. Reading about the crime itself is heartbreaking and disturbing, and not because Lysiak is being gratuitous, but I might recommend some readers skip that chapter. As a higher ed professional, I found myself drawn most to the discussion of why this happened and how we can prevent it in the future. Issues related to gun laws feel like a bit of a red herring (as Lysiak points out, Adam was already in violation of gun laws before he walked in the door), but society's inability to adequately treat mental health issues seems to be the primary culprit. Perhaps the most disturbing piece is that the Lanza's had no shortage of financial resources to devote to Adam's treatment, and yet here we stand. less

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