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mollyoneillwrites's review against another edition
5.0
This short but fascinating book unpacks the aftermath of 9/11 in the most literal sense – telling the story of deconstructing “the Pile” and how the emotionally charged site produced the best and the worst of New Yorkers.
nattygsmith's review against another edition
5.0
This is one of the best nonfiction pieces I've ever read. Langewiesche manages to be sensitive to all impacted sides of the tragedy of the Twin Towers, and I admire that he doesn't get mired down in who caused it, and what America's response was. This is really an elegy to the structures themselves - a detailed, physical description of what happened to them, what Ground Zero was like for months afterward, and real portraits of the men and women who worked to clear the site. The language is refreshingly simple, objective, and to the point, while still strikingly evocative and descriptive of what the World Trade Center site became immediately after 9/11.