Diary of 66: The Night I Burned Alive

by Alexandra Furnea

Diary of 66 is one woman's triumph over tragedy, and also a warning about the often-deadly consequences of corruption, in all of its shapes and forms. A young Romanian rock music journalist leaves home on the night of October 30, 2015, to go to a Goodbye to Gravity concert. She wants to write a review about the gig, to help promote the band, which is considered Romania's rising star on the local metal scene. Rock music has a troubling history of repression in the ex-communist country, and she wants to bring her contribution to dismantling the prejudice that surrounds it. She never gets to write the piece and the band doesn't finish the show either. A violent fire erupts in the Colectiv Club during the concert, trapping the audience inside. Over 180 people are severely injured and, in the days and months following the fire, 65 people lose their lives. Alexandra could have been number 66, but she survives against all odds. Diary of 66 is her memoir about the night of the fire and everything that came after her fight against death in the catastrophically ill-equipped hospitals in Romania, that lied about their incompetence and about the presence of dangerous multidrug resistant germs to protect the corrupted Government, her struggle to get appropriate care after she's discharged with open wounds and abandoned by the medical system, her journey towards recovery, and her life as a survivor of a national tragedy that made international headlines.

359 pages, Kindle Edition

Published October 15, 2024

About the author

Alexandra Furnea este redactor de carte, jurnalist și activist social. A absolvit Facultatea de Litere din cadrul Universității „Petru Maior“ din Târgu Mureș și are un masterat în studii americane la Universitatea din București. Între 2011 şi 2020 a fost redactor la revista muzicală Maximum Rock Magazin. Scrie poezie, proză și articole dedicate scenei muzicale underground pe blogul ei, www.genunderground.ro. Este supraviețuitoare a incendiului din clubul Colectiv, din 30 octombrie 2015.