Isaac's Storm: A Man, a Time, and the Deadliest Hurricane in History

"Few asked the obvious question: If the bureau had done such a great job, why did so many people die?"

Unfortunately, a confluence of ego, hubris, and ignorance is not a good combination for a coastal city. At nearly every stage of this storm's journey (which you can revisit here), people not wanting to admit they were wrong, that other people knew better, or that anything was amiss in their great state of prosperity hindered any sort of advance warning that Galveston might have had. The result was catastrophic damage, something like 8-10,000 people dead, and survivors that had to pick up the pieces.

I thought this was an incredibly compelling book that outlined the day-by-day progress of the storm and all the points of failure along the way. We also got a brief historical writeup beforehand about hurricane detection in history, which I thought was really interesting as well. The beef between Columbus and Bobadilla and the ending that story had was especially delicious. There's an incredible amount of notes and sources at the end too, which were also interesting to flip through.

If you're a weather enthusiast looking for hard science, maybe pass this one up, though. Everything's kept at a basic level, which is great for keeping the ley person engaged and on board. If you're looking for a compelling historical look at an epic disaster, though, definitely give this a look.

I love Erik Larson. It's true that the last ~100 pages of this book, when the storm -- still the worst natural disaster in U.S. history -- actually hits, are excellent. But the preceding 2/3 of the book feels like filler, as if Larson just didn't quite have enough material to make up an entire book.

I think that what a lot of people, including me, love about Larson is his meticulous research culled from a wide variety of sources, and when you have a huge storm that basically washes away an entire city, there isn't a whole lot of original source material left behind.

As a result, the first ~200 pages cover Isaac Cline's personal history as well as the history of the National Weather Service, which I didn't find particularly interesting. I'd recommend this book only to Larson completists and readers with a unique interest in Texas history and/or hurricanes.