Customer Reviews

Lunatic Wind: Surviving the Storm of the Century

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I love disaster books, and have since I was old enough to read chapter books. Early in my relationship with Amazon, I did a subject search on different disasters, and was suprised by the meager selection. There really are very few readable first-person/journalistic book-length disaster accounts available. We are indeed fortunate to have first-rate books like "The Perfect Storm," and "Isaac's Storm" come out so close together.

It is also the reason I must be kind in this review. These books remind you that you read books like this for two reasons. One is to participate vicariously in an intense experience. The second is to further our understanding of science--both social and physical. How does a disaster develop? How do we react to it? Were the right decisions made? This book, written before the others I mentioned, does not fufill any of these purposes very well.

"Lunatic Wind" is essentially a first-person account of the passage of Hurricane Hugo through South Carolina and how it affected a man, his two teen-aged sons and their grandmother. The account is very parochial and not very insightful.

Perhaps the most memorable passages are the descriptions of the two young men, doggedly ignoring and resourcefully dodging all attempts to keep them from surfing in a hurricane off a barrier island. If anything proves the late development of judgement skills in the adolescent this is it!

One hungers for comprehensive journalistic accounts of important disaster events like Hurricanes Hugo and Andrew: "How did the storms develop?" "Were they predicted accurately?" "How did people (and institutions) survive?" "What was the long-term impact?" But they are apparently rarely attempted. Which makes books like "Lunatic Wind" valuable.

"Lunatic Wind," should be seen as a primary source, a building block, to an eagerly anticipated comprehensive treatment of Hurricane Hugo.

This incredible book is the novelization on actual incidents that occurred during Hurricane Hugo. You will be unable to put this book down, in fact, you may very well fall off the edge of your seat!

Hello....what book is this? Is it about hurricane Hugo? I need lots of info about hurricane Hugo! Now!