The Only Plane in the Sky

Starred review from July 15, 2019
Wrenching, highly personal accounts of 9/11 and its aftermath. Former POLITICO and Washingtonian editor Graff (Raven Rock: The Story of the U.S. Government's Secret Plan To Save Itself--While the Rest of Us Die, 2017, etc.) returns with an impressive feat of organization, editing, and balance. He begins the story early in the morning of 9/11, proceeds through the entire day, and then follows up with comments from people about the ensuing weeks, months, and years. He spent three years collecting stories from a wide variety of people--survivors, responders, politicians, witnesses, family members--and then assembled the pieces into a coherent and powerful re-creation of the attacks on the twin towers, the Pentagon, and (perhaps) the Capitol, an attack that failed when the passengers aboard Flight 93 fought back, their plane crashing in a Pennsylvania field. Some of the storytellers' names are well known--e.g., Katie Couric, Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, Laura Bush--but most of them are not. Graff also does an admirable job of maintaining focus on the personal stories and does not drift off into political commentary--or engage in placing blame--or arrange the material so that some of his interviewees look good and some bad. Pretty much everyone emerges looking good, from President George W. Bush on down the political ladder--not to mention the stunning heroism of the fire and police departments and the unnumbered, and sometimes nameless, others who rushed to help. Graff excels at re-creating the anxiety and terror of that day: What is happening? What's next? Who did this? Most affecting of all, of course, are the accounts of those who survived, the responders who struggled to help (and who lost so many of their colleagues), and the families who learned a loved one would never be coming home. Pair this with Mitchell Zuckoff's Fall and Rise for a full, well-rounded perspective on this monumental tragedy. Readers who emerge dry-eyed from the text should check their pulses: Something is wrong with their hearts.

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Starred review from July 29, 2019
Journalist Graff (Raven Rock) organizes first-person accounts of 9/11 from numerous sources and adds contextualizing facts and maps to produce a harrowing and powerful narrative of that day. He follows airline personnel, passengers, and their spouses; first responders; those surrounding President Bush and the rest of the nation’s leadership; media employees; and others. Graff sets the stage with seemingly mundane decisions whose significance readers will suspect, such as choosing to have a pair of glasses fixed rather than going directly to work in Tower Two, or going back to a hotel room for a different shirt before a meeting. As the crises unfold, Graff balances the reports of rescues and deaths from New York and the Pentagon with reactions aboard Air Force One; in Shanksville, Penn., where Flight 93 crashed; and in other relevant locations. Graff doesn’t shy away from describing casualties, such as those who jumped from the towers, but keeps those passages brief. By the end of the day, there are some tearful reunions, but the hospitals, braced to receive hundreds of casualties, are eerily empty. The bewilderment, fear, and courage exhibited on that day are palpable in these recollections. This vivid, moving work is painful to read but honors both those who died and those who survived that awful day.

September 1, 2019

One of the most traumatic days in U.S. history was the September 11, 2001, al-Qaeda hijackings of four airliners turned into weapons of mass destruction. Graff (Raven Rock), director of Aspen Institute's cybersecurity and technology program, spent three years conducting hundreds of interviews with those who became heroes, victims, and survivors on the day when all U.S. flights were grounded, except Air Force One. Included are oral histories conducted by journalists and historians, resulting in an hour-by-hour remembrance of that day. Overarching themes are the heroism of first responders and civilians, families torn apart and trying to pick up the pieces of their lives, and the transformation of a country mired in chaos to one steeled to destroy the terrorists responsible for 2,983, and counting, deaths. President George W. Bush, who was shuttled on Air Force One from Washington, DC, to military bases in Louisiana and Nebraska, then back to the capital, all on 9/11, delivered the most important speech of his presidency that evening. That, along with the heartrendering evacuation of New York's World Trade Center, are two of many threads that will stay with readers. VERDICT This excellent oral history provides a much-needed perspective of the events and aftermath.--Karl Helicher, formerly with Upper Merion Twp. Lib., King of Prussia, PA

Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from August 1, 2019
9/11 was a tragedy before it became a symbol and dividing line in American history, an act of violence that killed almost 3000 people and deeply impacted the lives of thousands of survivors, thousands more who lost loved ones, first responders, and many communities. As it begins to recede into history, award-winning journalist Graff (Raven Rock, 2017) has gathered memories, testimonies, and transcripts into a collective oral history designed to help readers "to hear others' stories, to know what it was like to experience the day firsthand, to wrestle with the confusion and the terror." Drawing on a wide range of earlier oral history work and his own interviews, Graff juxtaposes the basic narrative of 9/11?the hijackings, the collapsing structures and their impacts, the response to the attacks by political leaders and the military?with a diverse group of individual experiences. There are tragedies and losses, moments of heroism and survival, and fears and foreshadowings of a darker future to come. "We were spared," recalls one survivor, "but everything changed." This book is an excellent resource for readers seeking to understand how, and why.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)