In 2018, California had the worst fire, destroying the town of Paradise. There were 85 people killed. Close to 1,400 homes and businesses burnt to the ground. This would be 90% of the town, of Paradise burnt. Attempting to escape the fire, on the narrow Skyway Road, the only road out of town, were a family of four. a retired doctor and his wife, a secretary, a pregnant woman, her toddler son and two bank robbers, in a large SUV. Fire everywhere, heavy forests, dry trees and brush from no rain. Winds up to 70 mph. A perfect recipe for destruction of lives, homes and business. The fire was caused by corporate greed. A hundred-year-old transmission line with poor maintenance. Climate change ignorance and fire prevention steps by everyone. The residents learned a lot about surviving. You are responsible for survival of yourself. You!

The most comprehensive and authoritative representation in English of the remarkable Shen Congwen canon, ranging from the polished stories that made him a serious contender for the Nobel literary prize in the 1980s to lesser known, extravagant experimental pieces.

The harrowing story of the most destructive American wildfire in a century. On November 8, 2018, the ferocious Camp Fire razed nearly every home in Paradise, California, and killed at least 85 people. Journalists Alastair Gee and Dani Anguiano reported on Paradise from the day the fire began and conducted hundreds of in-depth interviews with residents, firefighters and police, and scientific experts. Fire in Paradise is their dramatic narrative of the disaster and an unforgettable story of an American town at the forefront of the climate emergency.

The definitive firsthand account of California’s Camp Fire, the nation’s deadliest wildfire in a century, Paradise is a riveting examination of what went wrong and how to avert future tragedies as the climate crisis unfolds. “A tour de force story of wildfire and a terrifying look at what lies ahead.”—San Francisco Chronicle (Best Books of the Year) On November 8, 2018, the people of Paradise, California, awoke to a mottled gray sky and gusty winds. Soon the Camp Fire was upon them, gobbling an acre a second. Less than two hours after the fire ignited, the town was engulfed in flames, the residents trapped in their homes and cars. By the next morning, eighty-five people were dead. As a reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle, Lizzie Johnson was there as the town of Paradise burned. She saw the smoldering rubble of a historic covered bridge and the beloved Black Bear Diner and she stayed long afterward, visiting shelters, hotels, and makeshift camps. Drawing on years of on-the-ground reporting and reams of public records, including 911 calls and testimony from a grand jury investigation, Johnson provides a minute-by-minute account of the Camp Fire, following residents and first responders as they fight to save themselves and their town. We see a young mother fleeing with her newborn; a school bus full of children in search of an escape route; and a group of paramedics, patients, and nurses trapped in a cul-de-sac, fending off the fire with rakes and hoses. In Paradise, Johnson documents the unfolding tragedy with empathy and nuance. But she also investigates the root causes, from runaway climate change to a deeply flawed alert system to Pacific Gas and Electric’s decades-long neglect of critical infrastructure. A cautionary tale for a new era of megafires, Paradise is the gripping story of a town wiped off the map and the determination of its people to rise again.

On Saturday 9th September, 1922, the victorious Turkish cavalry rode into Smyrna, the richest and most cosmopolitan city in the Ottoman Empire. What happened over the next two weeks must rank as one of the most compelling human dramas of the twentieth century. Almost two million people were caught up in a disaster of truly epic proportions. PARADISE LOST is told with the narrative verve that has made Giles Milton a bestselling historian. It unfolds through the memories of the survivors, many of them interviewed for the first time, and the eyewitness accounts of those who found themselves caught up in one of the greatest catastrophes of the modern age.

Perfect for fans of I Survived and the Who Was series, and packed with graphics, photos, and facts for curious minds, this is a gripping look at the deadliest fires in American history. As the sun sank over the town of Peshtigo, Wisconsin, one warm October night in 1871, a smoky haze hung in the dry air. There had been little rain, and small fires had been rolling through town continuously since the Summer. For weeks the people had tried to protect their homes and businesses from fire. But they could not protect themselves from what would culminate in the deadliest fire in American history. As industrialization surged across the country, and Westward colonization leveled forests to build cities, fires became a mainstay in American life. And as populations grew, so too did the human toll that fire could exact. Through the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Americans searched for new and innovative ways to combat the threat of fire. And with climate change threatening to set the whole world aflame, we are once again in a fight for our planet’s future. Through the eyes of scientists, witnesses, and survivors of terrible fires alike, Sibert Honor author Deborah Hopkinson brings the horrific history of deadly fires to life, tracing a line from the Peshtigo and Great Chicago fires of 1871 to the wildfires raging in the western United States today. Filled with more than 50 period photographs and illustrations, facts, and pull-out boxes for eager nonfiction readers.

California Gothic explores the California dream and its dark inversion as a nightmare, as illustrated in fiction, poetry, and film. California began as a literary invention, a magic island, in a Spanish romance before conquistadors first visited the land. From early days to the present, the California dream of happiness in a land of new beginnings has been maintained by suppression of disturbing realities: above all, the destruction of native peoples; and by events and facts such as the tragedy of the Donner Party, the persistence of poverty and crime in the golden land, disturbing crimes such as the Black Dahlia; and pandemics and ecological disaster. This book explores a rich Gothic tradition that exposes the repressed past and imagines the fates awaiting a failed California.