Details
Synopsis
Full of dramatic survivor stories and vivid storm descriptions, this fast-paced historical analysis chronicles the events surrounding the devastating 1900 Galveston hurricane, and asserts that the city's Weather Bureau--and its head meteorologist Isaac Cline--grossly underestimated Galveston's vulnerability to storms.
| Size | | Length: | 323 pages | | Height: | 9.5 in | | Width: | 6.3 in | | Thickness: | 1.2 in | | Weight: | 22.4 oz |
Industry Reviews
"A meticulously researched and compelling book that far exceeds the scope of the weather-disaster genre."
Wall Street Journal - Hugh Willoughby (09/03/1999)
"In ISAAC'S STORM, Erik Larson provides more than the biography of a weather event by assembling a complex fable from the horrific details such a storm leaves in its aftermath....Larson moves us through all of this, plus the history of hurricanes, the invention of weather science and a touch of chaos theory, with the dispatch of an adrenalized Charles Dickens."
Fox
"This book is gripping, informative and imaginative from start to finish. Larson combines abundant "human interest" with a good dollop of history and just enough science. He is clear and succinct on the mechanics of these meteorological demons, and his lyrical descriptions of harmless water droplets swelling into gigantic, lethal, airborne armouries stir the spirit."
Abrams
"With a novelized narrative full of images so vivid they linger into dreams, Larson tells the story of the catastrophic hurricane that struck Galveston on Sept. 8, 1900, killing at least 8,000 people."
Grossman
"At once a chilling disaster tale enlivened by survivors' accounts, this is also the tragedy of Isaac Cline....It's a tale just as thrilling and heartbreaking as the sinking of the Titanic."
Leggiere
"Isaac's Storm"...richly imagined and prodigiously researched, pulls readers into the eye of the hurricane, and into everyday lives and state-of-the-art science. It is a gripping account, horridly fascinating to its core, and all the more compelling for being true."
Bolster
"The author, a contributing editor of Time magazine, has produced a riveting, deeply researched narrative that is driven by a prose style of descriptive elegance and power. The result is authoritative history given the gloss of high journalism, and the sense of immediacy such a combination produces is at times breathtaking....Good as it is as disaster narrative, ISACC'S STORM also shines as a character study, as an anatomy of hurricanes, and as a lively expose of bureaucratic stupidity."
Washington Post Book World (09/19/1999)
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