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The Sheltered Storm
The Sheltered Storm is a true story about the Sandy Hook shooter, his mother, and America.
835 pages, ebook
First published January 1, 2020
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September 11, 2020I don't know why I read this. School shootings are one of those topics where once you've read about one or two, you've read about them all. I got my fill back when the Virginia Tech shooting happened, and by the time Sandy Hook happened, I was no longer interested in the phenomenon. What's more, I think there's a strong case to be made that censoring non-academic publications on this topic would help decrease their prevalence (at least it might've, in the pre-internet era). As this very book acknowledges, there's a strong copycat element to the incidence of school shootings. Knowing that, why did the author bother to write it?
In fairness, the author has enough self awareness to make some adjustments to the telling. Shooters other than Adam Lanza are not identified by name, there aren't any detailed descriptions of people being shot or bombed, nor are there any listings of numbers of victims. Even so, this is still a long book about one school shooter in specific, with long narrations of shootings. The author's formal changes seem more like a fig leaf than anything.
Even worse, this is a narrativized account. It has all the downsides of needing to stick to actual events rather than tell an interesting story, but it also doesn't have the organizational and presentational clarity you'd expect of a non-fiction book. Many times I asked myself "why is this relevant" as I skimmed through a section.
I didn't count, but I'd guess a quarter to a third of this book is about gun control legislation in the US, and there are few topics I can imagine which are less interesting. I'll spoil it: at no point is any kind of any general gun ban implemented. The sheer repetitiveness of this process is a theme of the book, but I did not need to experience it firsthand (I skimmed these at light speed). Almost as boring are the repeated miniature retellings of pre-Sandy Hook mass murders. These I also skimmed, except for the Scottish Dunblane shooting, which was actually somewhat interesting, especially since it had a lasting effect on British law. Even more bizarre are segments on Travis the killer chimp, Adam's once-psychiatrist Dr. Fox's dalliances with his patients, and histories of various landmarks around Newton.
The Adam-centred narrative is actually well done, partly because a large portion is focused more on Adam's mother Nancy. In many ways, this book is the tragedy of Nancy's life. For all her foibles, I can't say Nancy was a bad person. Yes, she made a lot of mistakes along the way, and lying to people about her health isn't winning her any points, but she didn't deserve to be murdered by her own son and be remembered by the world as the mother of a child killer. Yes, her handling of Adam's mental illnesses wasn't perfect, but she was fighting an uphill battle almost every step of the way. Aside from buying the guns, I think her main failing was clinging to a delusion that he would someday be normal. But what was she supposed to do? The delusion that he could be normal was his own, and he would never accept living in a group home or anything like that. I think her only option would have been to treat him medically against his will, but that would probably involve physical fighting, and wouldn't be able to continue once he turned 18 anyway. She really had no good options. Nancy breaking down Adam's delusion of being a soldier shows she clearly understood his limitations to an extent. Additionally, the degree to which she had no knowledge of her son's mental state in his later years is shocking. As the author points out, it's entirely possible some random tumblr user who interacted with Adam a few times had a better idea of what was driving him than the mother he lived with every day of his life. Still, I imagine living with Adam was a nightmare. The anecdote that Adam would have a meltdown if he smelled food cooking speaks to how difficult it would be living with him. I imagine the retreat to his room was as much to placate his own fears and obsessions as to maintain Nancy's sanity.
Peter comes off more sympathetically than one would expect. It was a bit of a revelation that he was trying to maintain contact with Adam in the last two years of his life, but was being continually rebuffed and could not get an inroad with Nancy. Ryan is almost entirely absent from the story, except when he is mistaken for the shooter, which surprised me the most out of anything. I get that Adam was never the most gregarious kid, but reading this book gives the impression they almost never interacted, ever. They were only four years apart! Did Nancy ever relate any stories of them playing together? Was there any record of electronic communication between them? Nancy has seemingly achieved the impossible in raising two only children under the same roof, sharing two parents.
Entirely absent is any discussion of the most interesting aspect of Sandy Hook, the conspiracy theories. The phenomenon of Sandy Hook trutherism is the most bizarre reaction to a mass shooting ever, and it's developed into its very own media circus, with a parent of a murdered child suing an author for defamation.
There are no inline citations, but there is a fairly detailed bibliography using a mixture of primary sources, official reports and newspaper articles.
In fairness, the author has enough self awareness to make some adjustments to the telling. Shooters other than Adam Lanza are not identified by name, there aren't any detailed descriptions of people being shot or bombed, nor are there any listings of numbers of victims. Even so, this is still a long book about one school shooter in specific, with long narrations of shootings. The author's formal changes seem more like a fig leaf than anything.
Even worse, this is a narrativized account. It has all the downsides of needing to stick to actual events rather than tell an interesting story, but it also doesn't have the organizational and presentational clarity you'd expect of a non-fiction book. Many times I asked myself "why is this relevant" as I skimmed through a section.
I didn't count, but I'd guess a quarter to a third of this book is about gun control legislation in the US, and there are few topics I can imagine which are less interesting. I'll spoil it: at no point is any kind of any general gun ban implemented. The sheer repetitiveness of this process is a theme of the book, but I did not need to experience it firsthand (I skimmed these at light speed). Almost as boring are the repeated miniature retellings of pre-Sandy Hook mass murders. These I also skimmed, except for the Scottish Dunblane shooting, which was actually somewhat interesting, especially since it had a lasting effect on British law. Even more bizarre are segments on Travis the killer chimp, Adam's once-psychiatrist Dr. Fox's dalliances with his patients, and histories of various landmarks around Newton.
The Adam-centred narrative is actually well done, partly because a large portion is focused more on Adam's mother Nancy. In many ways, this book is the tragedy of Nancy's life. For all her foibles, I can't say Nancy was a bad person. Yes, she made a lot of mistakes along the way, and lying to people about her health isn't winning her any points, but she didn't deserve to be murdered by her own son and be remembered by the world as the mother of a child killer. Yes, her handling of Adam's mental illnesses wasn't perfect, but she was fighting an uphill battle almost every step of the way. Aside from buying the guns, I think her main failing was clinging to a delusion that he would someday be normal. But what was she supposed to do? The delusion that he could be normal was his own, and he would never accept living in a group home or anything like that. I think her only option would have been to treat him medically against his will, but that would probably involve physical fighting, and wouldn't be able to continue once he turned 18 anyway. She really had no good options. Nancy breaking down Adam's delusion of being a soldier shows she clearly understood his limitations to an extent. Additionally, the degree to which she had no knowledge of her son's mental state in his later years is shocking. As the author points out, it's entirely possible some random tumblr user who interacted with Adam a few times had a better idea of what was driving him than the mother he lived with every day of his life. Still, I imagine living with Adam was a nightmare. The anecdote that Adam would have a meltdown if he smelled food cooking speaks to how difficult it would be living with him. I imagine the retreat to his room was as much to placate his own fears and obsessions as to maintain Nancy's sanity.
Peter comes off more sympathetically than one would expect. It was a bit of a revelation that he was trying to maintain contact with Adam in the last two years of his life, but was being continually rebuffed and could not get an inroad with Nancy. Ryan is almost entirely absent from the story, except when he is mistaken for the shooter, which surprised me the most out of anything. I get that Adam was never the most gregarious kid, but reading this book gives the impression they almost never interacted, ever. They were only four years apart! Did Nancy ever relate any stories of them playing together? Was there any record of electronic communication between them? Nancy has seemingly achieved the impossible in raising two only children under the same roof, sharing two parents.
Entirely absent is any discussion of the most interesting aspect of Sandy Hook, the conspiracy theories. The phenomenon of Sandy Hook trutherism is the most bizarre reaction to a mass shooting ever, and it's developed into its very own media circus, with a parent of a murdered child suing an author for defamation.
There are no inline citations, but there is a fairly detailed bibliography using a mixture of primary sources, official reports and newspaper articles.
May 31, 2020
One of the best books I’ve ever read on not only Sandy Hook, but also the phenomenon of mass shootings not only in America, but also all over the world. The subject of this story is very much the Sandy Hook shooter, but it also ties in all the mass shootings that led up to Sandy Hook and how they impacted the shooter. Impeccably researches, and very well written.
July 9, 2022
this book was fantastic. there's so much information here, but it's still fast-paced. i read the bulk in two days and actually had to force myself to stop reading. i would keep thinking that i needed to get up and eat or something and then be unable to quit. i think this is due to the fact that the author is a blogger, so the chapters and sub-chapters feel more like blog posts than anything else. i like reading blogs so this is a plus for me. on the other hand, some sections felt random, such as the one detailing the towns founding or local landmarks. on the OTHER hand, chapters in this book are autonomous, so you can safely skim or skip any bits that don't interest you.
i especially liked the amount of context nolan gives for why mass shootings exist. rather than being a 'senseless tragedy,' they are the necessary product of a culture of isolation and gun worship. at some point the back-and-forth sections talking about gun control became almost boring because .
despite my good review i did not enjoy reading this. actually it made me feel intense dread and horror. sometimes while reading i would start crying without knowing exactly why. all the mundane events from adam and nancy lanza's life seem nightmarish knowing how it all ends. happy events are worse than mundane events--at one point the book talks about a party adam held in high school and how happy nancy was that he seemed to be doing better. i don't know how to describe how i feel when i think about her hopefulness. it's just like a black hole.
i especially liked the amount of context nolan gives for why mass shootings exist. rather than being a 'senseless tragedy,' they are the necessary product of a culture of isolation and gun worship. at some point the back-and-forth sections talking about gun control became almost boring because .
despite my good review i did not enjoy reading this. actually it made me feel intense dread and horror. sometimes while reading i would start crying without knowing exactly why. all the mundane events from adam and nancy lanza's life seem nightmarish knowing how it all ends. happy events are worse than mundane events--at one point the book talks about a party adam held in high school and how happy nancy was that he seemed to be doing better. i don't know how to describe how i feel when i think about her hopefulness. it's just like a black hole.
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