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4.32 AVERAGE
4.32 AVERAGE
FANTASTIC! So very well written. I couldn’t put it down.
An excellent readable and thorough analysis of what happened (and what didn't happen) and who the two killers were.
Go read this review of Columbine. It is what made me want to read this book:
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/118329725
This book is written by a journalist who thoroughly investigated the Columbine tragedy. He interviewed victims, parents and countless people who were affected by the shooting.
It jumps between chapters focusing on the killers to chapters focusing on those affected. It was very effective to read the book this way as I would've found it too hard if the book had focused on the killers for an extended period of reading.
This book wasn't exactly what I was expecting. The author seemed to not go too into depth with the journal entries of the shooters. There was actually a part where he only quoted a short excerpt of a violent journal entry and in his notes he said he didn't want to include much more because of how brutal it was.
I guess he didn't want to publish much of the hatred the two shooters wrote about. I can understand that. The only thing was that the killers were even more evil than the book portrayed.
The chapters about the killers, Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, were both revolting and interesting. I found it hard to be reading about their lives. Part of the horror was how obviously disturbed they both were. I found it so hard to read about police not taking things as seriously as they should have.
But the book seemed to be provoking anyone reading it to ask themselves questions, such as
How can you tell the difference between normal teenage angst and a more serious problem?
The book brought up an incident where Dylan Klebold wrote a brutal story about murder for his creative writing class. The teacher was very disturbed and brought it to the attention of Dylan's principal. Dylan argued that it was just a story and didn't mean anything.
This chilled me to the bone because how can someone tell the difference between a person writing a story for creative purposes, versus a troubled person writing out their dark fantasies. I can definitely see the argument that it was a creative writing class but it's hard to know where teachers should draw the line, if at all.
I found this book painful to read and to be honest, even though it was a brilliant account of events, I still had questions. I found it hardest reading about Dylan and his parents. I couldn't understand completely why he decided to kill. Compared to Eric Harris, who was a psychopath, Dylan seemed to just be depressed and desperate for love.
After I finished the book, I read the wikipedia article about the killers. The article talks about them being bullied, where the book says they were not. The book says they both had active social lives and a fair amount of friends. As this book is considered the definitive study of the Columbine shooting, I'm guessing that there is still a lot of false information on the internet.
I'm just rambling about stuff here. Check out the link to the other review. It's a more cohesive review. I can't say I "enjoyed" this book but it was an interesting read. I definitely learned a lot about the subject and it was good to read about survivors who didn't let it define their lives. It was just good to read about the strength of the survivors.
There were thirteen victims that day, plus the suicides of the two shooters. That left fifteen families struggling to understand why and just trying to cope. It shook the whole town and in a way, the world. I know when I heard about it, I was 12 years old and I honestly couldn't understand why two people would do such an evil thing.
Now thirteen years later, I've read a book that tried to explain their motives.
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/118329725
This book is written by a journalist who thoroughly investigated the Columbine tragedy. He interviewed victims, parents and countless people who were affected by the shooting.
It jumps between chapters focusing on the killers to chapters focusing on those affected. It was very effective to read the book this way as I would've found it too hard if the book had focused on the killers for an extended period of reading.
This book wasn't exactly what I was expecting. The author seemed to not go too into depth with the journal entries of the shooters. There was actually a part where he only quoted a short excerpt of a violent journal entry and in his notes he said he didn't want to include much more because of how brutal it was.
I guess he didn't want to publish much of the hatred the two shooters wrote about. I can understand that. The only thing was that the killers were even more evil than the book portrayed.
The chapters about the killers, Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, were both revolting and interesting. I found it hard to be reading about their lives. Part of the horror was how obviously disturbed they both were. I found it so hard to read about police not taking things as seriously as they should have.
But the book seemed to be provoking anyone reading it to ask themselves questions, such as
How can you tell the difference between normal teenage angst and a more serious problem?
The book brought up an incident where Dylan Klebold wrote a brutal story about murder for his creative writing class. The teacher was very disturbed and brought it to the attention of Dylan's principal. Dylan argued that it was just a story and didn't mean anything.
This chilled me to the bone because how can someone tell the difference between a person writing a story for creative purposes, versus a troubled person writing out their dark fantasies. I can definitely see the argument that it was a creative writing class but it's hard to know where teachers should draw the line, if at all.
I found this book painful to read and to be honest, even though it was a brilliant account of events, I still had questions. I found it hardest reading about Dylan and his parents. I couldn't understand completely why he decided to kill. Compared to Eric Harris, who was a psychopath, Dylan seemed to just be depressed and desperate for love.
After I finished the book, I read the wikipedia article about the killers. The article talks about them being bullied, where the book says they were not. The book says they both had active social lives and a fair amount of friends. As this book is considered the definitive study of the Columbine shooting, I'm guessing that there is still a lot of false information on the internet.
I'm just rambling about stuff here. Check out the link to the other review. It's a more cohesive review. I can't say I "enjoyed" this book but it was an interesting read. I definitely learned a lot about the subject and it was good to read about survivors who didn't let it define their lives. It was just good to read about the strength of the survivors.
There were thirteen victims that day, plus the suicides of the two shooters. That left fifteen families struggling to understand why and just trying to cope. It shook the whole town and in a way, the world. I know when I heard about it, I was 12 years old and I honestly couldn't understand why two people would do such an evil thing.
Now thirteen years later, I've read a book that tried to explain their motives.
3.5 stars. Good research but the organization wasn't always the most logical to me. Could have used a list of characters to refer back to and some edits.
Wow. What a powerful, riveting, and compelling book. It's been less than 48 hours since I picked it up and I read everything, including all the notes at the end. I picked this up because I started listening to Wondery's new podcast, "Confronting Columbine," which is just as riveting. It is really interesting to hear directly from the survivors and those involved and hear about their lives more than two decades later.
Columbine had a profound impact on me. I was in eighth grade in April 1999, about to leave the tiny private school that I had attended since kindergarten and move to the large public school system in the town where I lived. I remember being in the car and hearing the first new reports over the radio. I don't remember exactly how I followed the news in those days before the Internet was everywhere, but somehow I did. I absorbed all the initial myths that were reported in those days, and while I gradually became aware that that wasn't the real story, there are definitely things I was not aware of before reading this book.
I read in another review of this book the question of why Columbine became (and at least to a certain extent, still is) such a big deal. And while there was plenty of exploration of that in this book, I feel like at least part of that was only briefly mentioned and maybe not given the weight it deserved. I think part of the reason Columbine took such a hold (certainly why I became so aware of it) was that Evangelicals who pushed the story, particularly the story regarding Cassie Bernall and her supposed martyrdom. Yes, Misty's book was mentioned in here, along with quotes from Cassie's pastor: "You will never change the story of Cassie... The church is going to stick to the martyr story. You can say it didn't happen that way, but the church won't accept it." That was entirely true. I had a copy of Misty's book, probably pretty shortly after it was published (I don't remember if I wanted to get it or if it was just given to me). I was enthralled by her story. And it wasn't just Misty's book - there was a "She Said Yes" music project that put out a compilation album a year after the book was released, with songs written specifically about Cassie by some of the leading Christian artists of the day. It seemed like everybody in the church knew the story of the girl who died because she believed in God. (The story was still referenced in presidential debates in 2016.)
During that time period, late 90s - early 2000s, it seemed like the church was obsessed with stories of martyrs - I had at least two other books that were simply collections of stories of martyrs throughout history, starting from the earliest days of the church up through the present day. I don't know if it was specifically a millennium thing or just the end-of-days stuff that was prevalent back then. Dying for your faith was considered the most amazing thing that you could possibly ever do, and they exploited the story of Cassie for all it was worth. They also treated the girl that the story was *actually* about horribly, saying she was lying. But she survived, and could very well have upset their narrative by not remaining as firm in her faith in the future. It's easy to make a saint out of a dead person, they can't make any further mistakes.
I didn't know for years that the story wasn't true, and even then, it was a "well, it might not have happened that way." Reading that they knew unequivocally that the story wasn't true even before the book was published upset me so much. They decided not to let the facts get in the way of the story, because they felt the story would be the catalyst to lead a generation to Christ. Guess what? It didn't work. There are countless stories about how millennials, including those who were raised in the church, are not as involved in organized religion as previous generations. I wonder if at least part of the reason that so many people decided to leave is that they saw situations like this, where church leaders decided the truth didn't matter, that the ends justified the means. I was also incredibly saddened by the story of the Lutheran minister who did the funeral for the Klebold family and continued to offer support to the parents, and lost his position in his church and had to leave the state in order to find a new job, at least for a while. Aren't Christians supposed to be compassionate to those who are suffering? The victims and their families did not have a monopoly on suffering. The idea that a congregation could so vehemently oppose their pastor counseling the parents of one of the killers that they would run him out of their congregation sickens me, though doesn't necessarily surprise me.
This has turned more into an essay about the failings of the American church at this time than about the book itself, but these are the thoughts that came up as I read it. It reads like a novel, and even the dryer psychological analysis parts were fascinating to read. I don't know that it gives us any answers about how to prevent another tragedy, but maybe there are no answers. It certainly hasn't stopped happening in the 22 years since.
Columbine had a profound impact on me. I was in eighth grade in April 1999, about to leave the tiny private school that I had attended since kindergarten and move to the large public school system in the town where I lived. I remember being in the car and hearing the first new reports over the radio. I don't remember exactly how I followed the news in those days before the Internet was everywhere, but somehow I did. I absorbed all the initial myths that were reported in those days, and while I gradually became aware that that wasn't the real story, there are definitely things I was not aware of before reading this book.
I read in another review of this book the question of why Columbine became (and at least to a certain extent, still is) such a big deal. And while there was plenty of exploration of that in this book, I feel like at least part of that was only briefly mentioned and maybe not given the weight it deserved. I think part of the reason Columbine took such a hold (certainly why I became so aware of it) was that Evangelicals who pushed the story, particularly the story regarding Cassie Bernall and her supposed martyrdom. Yes, Misty's book was mentioned in here, along with quotes from Cassie's pastor: "You will never change the story of Cassie... The church is going to stick to the martyr story. You can say it didn't happen that way, but the church won't accept it." That was entirely true. I had a copy of Misty's book, probably pretty shortly after it was published (I don't remember if I wanted to get it or if it was just given to me). I was enthralled by her story. And it wasn't just Misty's book - there was a "She Said Yes" music project that put out a compilation album a year after the book was released, with songs written specifically about Cassie by some of the leading Christian artists of the day. It seemed like everybody in the church knew the story of the girl who died because she believed in God. (The story was still referenced in presidential debates in 2016.)
During that time period, late 90s - early 2000s, it seemed like the church was obsessed with stories of martyrs - I had at least two other books that were simply collections of stories of martyrs throughout history, starting from the earliest days of the church up through the present day. I don't know if it was specifically a millennium thing or just the end-of-days stuff that was prevalent back then. Dying for your faith was considered the most amazing thing that you could possibly ever do, and they exploited the story of Cassie for all it was worth. They also treated the girl that the story was *actually* about horribly, saying she was lying. But she survived, and could very well have upset their narrative by not remaining as firm in her faith in the future. It's easy to make a saint out of a dead person, they can't make any further mistakes.
I didn't know for years that the story wasn't true, and even then, it was a "well, it might not have happened that way." Reading that they knew unequivocally that the story wasn't true even before the book was published upset me so much. They decided not to let the facts get in the way of the story, because they felt the story would be the catalyst to lead a generation to Christ. Guess what? It didn't work. There are countless stories about how millennials, including those who were raised in the church, are not as involved in organized religion as previous generations. I wonder if at least part of the reason that so many people decided to leave is that they saw situations like this, where church leaders decided the truth didn't matter, that the ends justified the means. I was also incredibly saddened by the story of the Lutheran minister who did the funeral for the Klebold family and continued to offer support to the parents, and lost his position in his church and had to leave the state in order to find a new job, at least for a while. Aren't Christians supposed to be compassionate to those who are suffering? The victims and their families did not have a monopoly on suffering. The idea that a congregation could so vehemently oppose their pastor counseling the parents of one of the killers that they would run him out of their congregation sickens me, though doesn't necessarily surprise me.
This has turned more into an essay about the failings of the American church at this time than about the book itself, but these are the thoughts that came up as I read it. It reads like a novel, and even the dryer psychological analysis parts were fascinating to read. I don't know that it gives us any answers about how to prevent another tragedy, but maybe there are no answers. It certainly hasn't stopped happening in the 22 years since.
informative
sad
medium-paced
Most of what we know and think about the incident--and aftermath--at Columbine High School, in 1999, is wrong. That's the first big aha! in this book. The other is that some people behaved admirably and with great compassion, kindness and sensitivity in unraveling what really happened and protecting the kids and community. And a handful of people moved to cover their own rears, or take advantage of a tragic event. Cullen's book does a good job of connecting lots of dots, weaving a whole cloth story-- but there are occasionally jarring moments, where two stories don't quite mesh, or tiny details are simply lost to time. Like any incredible, transformative event, there are always differences of opinion, as well. But--this is the definitive book on how this could happen, and why it will almost certainly continue to happen. A gripping and excellent read.
I need to do some lighter reading, this book gave me stomachaches. After describing one of my stomachaches to Kait, she asked “what value are you even getting out of reading this?” It made me pause and question if I really wanted to see it through, but I did and came away with this:
The media reporting on active situations and investigations means that misinformation is going to be spread regardless of intention. There’s a lot people get wrong about Columbine, and it all goes back to that. The shooters weren’t bullied, they weren’t gay depressed goths, they weren’t anti religion, and they weren’t losers. They were good students, they were well liked, and the real but boring explanation is that they were mentally unwell. Eric (main guy) was diagnosed posthumously as a psychopath. He decided he hated humanity, and warped his partners bipolar mind full of suicidal ideations to fit his own vision. They intended to act on April 19, not the 20th, as it was the anniversary of Waco, and the Oklahoma City Bombing. They intended to BOMB the school, and shoot the stragglers. They weren’t targeting anyone, it was everyone.
The part I’m still digesting is how to feel about their parents. They lost their children too, and wasn’t like they committed any sort of parenting malpractice to affect their children in some negative way. You could have the best of intentions and still raise a psychopath, and that’s terrifying.
All that to say, I’m going to read some nice fiction now. The book was powerful but I kind of hated the experience. I’m glad I learned all this? Maybe? I don’t know. The author was creepy at times 4 stars
The media reporting on active situations and investigations means that misinformation is going to be spread regardless of intention. There’s a lot people get wrong about Columbine, and it all goes back to that. The shooters weren’t bullied, they weren’t gay depressed goths, they weren’t anti religion, and they weren’t losers. They were good students, they were well liked, and the real but boring explanation is that they were mentally unwell. Eric (main guy) was diagnosed posthumously as a psychopath. He decided he hated humanity, and warped his partners bipolar mind full of suicidal ideations to fit his own vision. They intended to act on April 19, not the 20th, as it was the anniversary of Waco, and the Oklahoma City Bombing. They intended to BOMB the school, and shoot the stragglers. They weren’t targeting anyone, it was everyone.
The part I’m still digesting is how to feel about their parents. They lost their children too, and wasn’t like they committed any sort of parenting malpractice to affect their children in some negative way. You could have the best of intentions and still raise a psychopath, and that’s terrifying.
All that to say, I’m going to read some nice fiction now. The book was powerful but I kind of hated the experience. I’m glad I learned all this? Maybe? I don’t know. The author was creepy at times 4 stars
I didn't think I'd be interested in a book about Columbine so many years after the attack. But my wife kept telling me what a great book it was, so I decided to try it, thinking I'd drop it quickly. Turns out, the book was so good I couldn't think of much else and blew through it in days.
It's a fascinating book that busts down all the myths that were taken as fact in the days, weeks, months and years after the killings. Highly recommended.
It's a fascinating book that busts down all the myths that were taken as fact in the days, weeks, months and years after the killings. Highly recommended.
This book gets 5 stars alone on Cullen's extensive knowledge and research of the massacre at Columbine High School on April 20, 1999. He has meticulously combed through virtually every piece of evidence: the journals left by the killers themselves, videos, first-person accounts, media coverage, along with his own research and interviews. I was enthralled with Cullen's writing, which is straightforward and poetic all at once. I left with more information than when I began. The most important thing this book does is dispel and clarify all rumors and misconceptions that were and are still rampant and synonymous with the tragedy. The layout of the book is a bit disjointed, but on purpose. He intertwined present with past, beginning, middle, and end out of order, victims', parents', and killers' stories all at once. I did not care for this style, but I understand he did it carefully and purposefully to allow the story to marinate and come to fullness in its own time. A great read for anyone who experienced this tragedy through the media reports over the years.