The Cocoanut Grove Fire

I grew up hearing my parents talk about the Cocoanut Grove fire but never knew the whole story until I discovered this book. The real facts of how the fire started will never be known but the causes have been narrowed down and, as with so many tragedies, medical breakthroughs in burn treatment and building safety have resulted from the disaster. This book draws all the known facts together without speculation. It's an intense, terrifying and sorrowful story.

Book came in the time frame and in the condition specified.

Excellent research presented in a very readable format. It's not too long, but still has a lot of content. Well done!

Like the author's other book "Boston On Fire," this story is almost impossible to put down once you start reading it. When you read the details of that tragic nightclub fire, it's difficult to believe it could even happen, much less happen so fast that hundreds were killed. But the recent fire at the Station Night Club in Rhode Island is so similar it's scary. Everyone likes to think they would figure out a way to escape such a fire, but some blazes, like the ones at the Cocoanut Grove and The Station Night Club move so fast that they are more like explosions. The author makes the reader feel as though they were actually in the fire. She also goes into the shady history of the nightclub's mobster owner and why so many exit doors were locked. The reader will never again look at revolving doors in the same way and they will always check out the locations of the nearest exit to where they are seated. This is a great read, but maybe not for just before going to bed. The struggles of some of the survivors bring tears to the eyes of the reader. The fire did prove many new techniques for treating burn victims worked. This book makes one believe in fate, luck and just plain good fortune.

I recently read Schorow's entry in the New England Remembers series, and it is a haunting book. Schorow has great details; a reporter, she used her skills to update a story that happened in 1942. This book is especially interesting to those who wondered what happened to the main characters after 1959, when Paul Benzaquin's book Holocaust! on the same subject was published.