Overall this book is pretty mediocre. It's fairly short, direct and gets right to the heart of the problem of disaster scenarios. It contains an overview of several different disasters though the eyes of who saw them, including a Latin American hostage situation, 9/11, and a hurricane. Overall the advice seems to be that relatively simple instructions and training would a long way to preparing us for disasters but doing so is difficult due to the structure of our society. False alarms also cause people to not react in the real disaster scenario.

It was pretty interesting to see the section on disassociation. The phenomenon is fairly frequent in literature/popular media. I was unaware just how common it was for people who do jobs with high levels of risk/disaster scenario occurring. It's also curious that people with this role train themselves to go into this state. Is this something that we should start institutionalizing and training in professions that benefit it? One note that makes me doubt this is the cop who speaks highly about this phenomenon is also a paid trainer for it so I'd like to see more evidence.

One thing that is interesting in this book and others is how often disaster/operational experts refer to the airplane disasters as an example of positive behavior. Is this because accidents during flights cause usage of airlines to decline therefore it's in the companies best interest to make them very safe? The other argument is that the NTSB is very effective at investigating and making changes to the industry. It seems remarkable that this one industry is held in high regards and there still seems to be low level ideas to steal for other industries. Consider the Checklist Manifesto which includes a long discussion on checklists in airline safety.

So if we have the answers and understand how to give better training, why aren't we pushing the government to do something about it? On a personal level, this is probably going to change my behavior in some small ways but I don't see any major revelations.

This is the first poetry book that I had picked up since school and it was delightful. I'd picked it up on recommendation after having started to look around for poetry books. It's amazing how effective a poem can be at invoking imagery and moving our feelings. This book really covers some profound topics such as being a child of immigrants, the challenges of leaving your culture behind, and what empowerment for women can bring. I've flagged a few poems that I particularly liked and shared them below but I do encourage you to go and read the book yourself.

you have so much
but are always hungry for more
stop looking up at everything you don't have
and look around at everything you do

-- where the satisfaction lives

i have survived far too much to go quietly
let a meteor take me
call the thunder for backup
my death will be gran
the land will crack
the sun will eat itself

-- the day i leave

learning to not envy
someone else's blessings
is what grace looks like

I think there is a profound power in understanding what others feel and one of the best methods to learn is from their writing. Someone else having gone though such troubles before is a relief and can give you strength from knowing that you don't walk your path alone. I haven't been reading any poetry for the last several years since I left school but that's a fact that will probably change purely based on the strength of this book. I already have another anthology that I've ordered and plan to order a couple more. Maybe I will share interesting thought provoking poems here.