Goodreads helps you keep track of books you want to read.

Start by marking “Columbine” as Want to Read:

Other editions

Enlarge cover

Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

Open Preview

Columbine

Dave Cullen (Goodreads Author)

4.27 · Rating details · 74,347 ratings · 8,402 reviews

"The tragedies keep coming. As we reel from the latest horror . . . " So begins a new epilogue, illustrating how Columbine became the template for nearly two decades of "spectacle murders." It is a false script, seized upon by a generation of new killers. In the wake of Newtown, Aurora, and Virginia Tech, the imperative to understand the crime that sparked this plague grow ...more

Get A Copy

Hardcover, 417 pages

Published April 6th 2009 by Twelve (first published March 1st 2009)

More Details... Edit Details

Friend Reviews

To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.

Reader Q&A

To ask other readers questions about Columbine, please sign up.

Lists with This Book

The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson

A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson

Best Non-Fiction (no biographies)

5,701 books — 8,136 voters

Best True Crime

1,153 books — 1,696 voters

More lists with this book...

Community Reviews

Showing 1-30

Average rating 4.27 ·

Rating details

· 74,347 ratings · 8,402 reviews

More filters

Sort order

Start your review of Columbine

May 31, 2009 Dave Cullen added it · (Review from the author) · review of another edition

I wrote the book, so I'll forego rating it, just thought it should show up my list so you would find me. (But I'm new to goodreads, so tell me if I'm going about it all wrong.) Thanks. ...more

flag 1328 likes · Like · see review

Mar 10, 2010 Joel rated it it was amazing

Shelves: non-fiction, vote-getters, 2011, audiobooks

I used to think that the Columbine massacre would be the defining event of my generation, the one friends and I would discuss years later, trading "where you when?" stories like I'd heard my parents do when remembering John F. Kennedy. It seemed so... monumental at the time. I was a senior in high school, the same age as the killers. The media attention was omnipresent and relentless and soon even at my small town school (and when I say "small town," I mean it, not the way the news will describe I used to think that the Columbine massacre would be the defining event of my generation, the one friends and I would discuss years later, trading "where you when?" stories like I'd heard my parents do when remembering John F. Kennedy. It seemed so... monumental at the time. I was a senior in high school, the same age as the killers. The media attention was omnipresent and relentless and soon even at my small town school (and when I say "small town," I mean it, not the way the news will describe a sleepy hamlet of 30,000), everyone began looking askance at the outsiders, the loners, the kids who came to school dressed in black and roamed the halls with a look on their faces like they hated the world, and it deserved it.

How surreal was it to turn on the television about a year later, after class in my freshman dorm room, to see the students from my high school running from the building, fleeing danger while news copters circled overheard? Turned out the "bombing incident" was the result of an idiot with a cherry bomb and access to a toilet, but Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold had already shown us that there is no such thing as a harmless threat when it comes to violence in high school. Columbine (or rather, the media circus it became) had changed everything.

Then one day, it was September 11, and I had a new definition for generation-defining tragedy, and Columbine stopped being something I thought about much.

Dave Cullen never stopped thinking about it. He was a reporter on the scene that very first day, April 20, 1999, when bodies began dropping from library windows and no one knew what the hell was happening. For ten years, he followed the case, the accusations of a police coverup, the lives of those who survived, the sorrows of the families of those who did not.

Columbine, the book, is an exhausting, heartbreaking, minute-by-minute, year-by-year analysis snaking into the past and future from the pivot point of April 20. Meticulously, he explains how everything we thought we knew about the violence that day -- you probably remember: outcasts targeting jocks, the Trench Coat Mafia, Marilyn Manson -- is totally wrong, the truth a victim of a media whirlwind that descended upon the tragedy, picked up garbled rumors and incorrect assumptions and flung them onto TVs and broadsheets across the country. No, Eric and Dylan were not outsiders; they were popular with a certain crowd and Eric even dated. No, they were not part of a cabal that hated jocks; the killings were random and the only real target was humanity. The killers didn't even like Marilyn Manson, preferring KMFDM.

If you have read anything about the case in the last decade, you probably know this already, but for many, the initial reporting of rumors and suppositions (fueling a 24-hour cable news cycle that was just gearing up in 1999) is what they remember, and has become the "truth" of the whole bloody affair.

People read, and probably write, books like this because they want to know why. After a decade of analyzing police records, psychological profiles, and the killers' own writings, Cullen presents an answer, but you aren't going to like it: Eric Harris was a psychopath, and Dylan Klebold was a manic-depressive hanger-on. That... doesn't make me feel any better. Wouldn't it be easier to think, those kids were picked on, it was wrong, but you can see it, they just snapped, it could happen to any of us? But no. Eric Harris didn't snap. He was a bright kid, a smooth talker, and he fooled the world while he spent a full year planning his masterpiece. Did you know that Columbine wasn't even a school shooting, not really? The actual plan was to blow up the building, killing hundreds indiscriminately. The guns were just an afterthought, to pick off the survivors. You know, for fun. Like Doom (there's another rumor for you).

This book is heartbreaking (the stories of the survivors and the grief-stricken nearly brought me to tears more than once, and not because Cullen is slick with his prose). This book is infuriating (details of a police coverup provide more than enough evidence that this tragedy probably could have been prevented). This book is strangely cathartic (I hate using sports as shorthand for healing, but I choked up when Columbine won the state football championships the year after the murders, and the crowd of students chanted together: "We.. are.. COLUMBINE!" Reclaiming the word, making it theirs again.)

I also wonder, and I am adding this a few days after the rest of the review, how necessary it really is. Why is Columbine such a big deal? As a day, it was certainly a pretty crappy day. But there have been a lot of other crappy days before and since, days that killed a lot more than 13 people, that we don't know about or can't remember. It was a seismic event because we let it be one -- I don't think it taught anyone anything, not really. Except maybe how useless constant as-it-happens reporting was going to turn out to be. I don't like that the book, in essence, continues to give Eric Harris exactly what he wanted, which was recognition that he had done something important. As an analysis of the fallout on a formerly unknown town, it's less troubling. As a warning against future violence, it's useless, since it's pretty clear there wasn't much that could be done to change the way it all turned out.

Whenever I see footage from 9/11 (something I try to avoid, but hey, it happens), my breath catches and my heart stops. Every time I see those burning towers, part of me thinks, hopes, that maybe this time, they won't fall. But no. They always fall. ...more

flag 497 likes · Like · see review

Jan 06, 2010 Paul Bryant rated it really liked it

Shelves: true-crime

What does it matter that two crazy teenagers shot 12 other teenagers and one teacher to death at a school somewhere in the American Midwest over ten years ago? It was just another school shooting and since then we have had Virginia Tech which accounted for nearly three times as many victims, didn’t it, not to mention any amount of death and catastrophe in places other than schools. Why should anyone want to write a book about this particular school shooting a decade down the line? Why should we ...more

flag 300 likes · Like · see review

Aug 05, 2009 Will Byrnes rated it really liked it

Shelves: nonfiction, terrorism, american-history

The very word “Columbine” summons an image of gun-toting teens mowing down teachers and students in their high schools. In the media frenzy of the time and in the years since certain misconceptions about the event have found their way into common wisdom. The perpetrators were portrayed as Goths, gays, members of a trenchcoat-wearing gang, victims of bullying jocks and social outcasts. None of this was true. Cullen was one of the reporters on the scene when Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed th ...more

flag 289 likes · Like · see review

Jul 05, 2009 Bill Kerwin rated it really liked it

Shelves: history

The definitive book on the most memorable US school shooting (at least before Newtown and Stoneman Douglas) by a reporter who followed the story for at least last ten years.

Dave Cullen demonstrates conclusively that almost everything we thought we knew about Columbine was wrong: 1) the shooters weren't particular objects of bullying, obvious misfits, members of "the trench coat mafia" or Marilyn Manson fans, 2)the shooters didn't target jocks or minorities (they hated a lot of things, including ...more

flag 180 likes · Like · see review

May 30, 2009 Gus Sanchez rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites-you-should-read, non-fiction, politics-and-current-events

Right off the bat, I will state that "Columbine" is one of the most riveting, fascinating, heartbreaking and revolting works of non-fiction you will ever read.

What sets "Columbine" apart from all of the investigative reporting done during the aftermath of perhaps the most notorious school shooting in US history is Dave Cullen's skillful ability to cut through the mythology and hysteria surrounding the entire event. Many of the myths that were accepted as "fact" - that Eric Harris and Dylan Kleb Right off the bat, I will state that "Columbine" is one of the most riveting, fascinating, heartbreaking and revolting works of non-fiction you will ever read.

What sets "Columbine" apart from all of the investigative reporting done during the aftermath of perhaps the most notorious school shooting in US history is Dave Cullen's skillful ability to cut through the mythology and hysteria surrounding the entire event. Many of the myths that were accepted as "fact" - that Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold were bullied loners who sought revenge against the jocks and the elites of Columbine - are irrevocably shattered. Utilizing countless pages and hours of testimony from survivors and others directly involved in the school shooting, including the infamous "Basement Tapes" recorded by Harris and Klebold just days before their rampage, Cullen paints in vivid detail the story of how an idyllic suburb suddenly became a buzzword for everything that was bad about everything; high school, parents, gun control, religion, etc.

Cullen smartly deflects the blame cast on Harris and Klebold's parents. If anything, the journals those two kept demonstrate teenagers have a tremendous capacity to mask their true feelings in the face of authority. In Eric Harris' case, he masked a case of classic textbook psychopathy; no amount of intervention or psychological evaluation could have revealed both his lack of empathy towards others and his massive superiority complex, both which led him to eventually conclude that he was indeed like a God, ready to enact his wrath on a world he deemed too stupid and lazy to live. Klebold, on the other hand, was, on the surface, just melancholy, but hid suicidal thoughts and tendencies, and saw his own death as the only way of truly achieving any peace and tranquility in his life. Apart, the deadly rampage at Columbine may never have taken place; together, with Harris' cold-blooded planning and Klebold's eagerness, Columbine became all but inevitable.

There is blame to be cast, and the villain0 of this story is the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department. Their incompetence during the shooting and after inadvertently gave rise to much of the hostility and mythology that took place during the aftermath of the shooting.

Regardless of all the details, Dave Cullen, on every page, painted a masterful image of the human tragedy that was Columbine. We became riveted with what Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold unleashed upon Columbine on April 20, 1999; Cullen reminds us that it's the "who" and the "why" of this event that gave it the gravity it deserved.

"Columbine" is recommended ready for everyone. Everyone. ...more

flag 145 likes · Like · see review

Jun 04, 2017 Matt rated it it was amazing

Recommended to Matt by: Mariah Roze

Shelves: audiobook, buddy-read

There comes a time that everyone must not only see outside the box, but read things that make them less than comfortable. Life is not always honeybees and flowers bursting with colour. Dave Cullen offers this sobering perspective as he tackles an insightful view into one of the worst school shootings in history, though I am not prepared to posit how one ranks school shootings from 'best' to 'worst'. Cullen pulls the reader in to explore not only the event that took place in a small Colorado comm There comes a time that everyone must not only see outside the box, but read things that make them less than comfortable. Life is not always honeybees and flowers bursting with colour. Dave Cullen offers this sobering perspective as he tackles an insightful view into one of the worst school shootings in history, though I am not prepared to posit how one ranks school shootings from 'best' to 'worst'. Cullen pulls the reader in to explore not only the event that took place in a small Colorado community in April 1999, but also the vast array of sentiments surrounding this shooting, both before and afterwards. The book throughly examines all three time periods, though not in a clear division, allowing the reader to learn much about Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, who have long been deemed evil personified. Cullen gives these boys a personality as he searches for the triggers that led them to act. While both did have their issues with the law, there were no outward signs of aggression in the way they interacted with the general community or even their families. The revelation, found mostly after the fact, showed a detailed plot to exact general revenge, through taped messages and journal entries. What Cullen does highlight is that many of the signs, particularly a website, were pooh-poohed by authorities, or the depth to which the hatred was brewing seemed to have been lost as others missed the signs. Cullen then gives a thorough and heart-wrenching account of the shooting day and how members of the school community became victims of chance. It appeared as though there were no 'specific targets', as long as Harris and Klebold killed and hurt many. Cullen ties in the ominous date and how the boys sought to top Oklahoma City in loss of life, all in an attempt to make names for themselves. Victims received names and faces throughout the narrative, as did the injured. Cullen appears not to have wanted to simply lump them together into 'the victim group' or 'those who barely got away'. Cullen also exemplifies the reaction by authorities to the events, from police to SWAT and even the national reaction from the White House. The reader cannot help but be swept up as they see how things were managed. Cullen then pulls the story into the aftermath and the synthesising of all the emotions and outpouring of grief. "Why?" and "How?" remained on the tips of everyone's tongues, as well as how the school, the county, and the country as a whole (perhaps even the world?) would bounce back from this. School officials did not wish to be burdened with the pall of events, though they could not simply turn a new page and forget. It is perhaps this thread that proved most powerful for me; how did the school seek to learn and yet not dwell? While media outlets sought to focus on Nazi worship and gun stockpiles, Columbine and county officials needed to rebuild. That said, Cullen also spends much time exploring the familial reactions to events, both the Harris and Klebold families as victims themselves, even though many sought to tar and feather them with ease. Bitterness and resentment were flooding the region, leaving little time for personal healing. Targets were painted, threats made, and families destroyed. How does one seek to rebuild when the core is gutted? It is this aspect of the tragedy that cannot be fixed with a coat of paint and new drywall, where steam cleaners and a memorial plaque cannot erase self-doubt and hatred towards those who destroyed the lives of many. There are so many more nuances within the book, though it is up to the courageous reader to sift through the book and pull out what touches them most deeply. Not a book for those looking to apportion blame or shake their heads at two lone souls. This is the kind of book that leaves readers thinking and examining themselves, as it will do for me while Neo continues his scholastic endeavours. Brilliantly presented and captivating on many levels!

As a journalist for the events, Dave Cullen brings a wonderful perspective and his writing pulls the reader in throughout this piece. I have pondered throughout reading and come to realise that this book is more than facts and names and places, it serves as a biography of an event. Yes, a biographical piece of time, not a life or a school or even the killers. It is the event that needs a face, a life, and a death, which Cullen offers up and allows the reader to dissect at will. By putting a face on the event, those actors who shaped it also come to life. As Cullen admits in his opening notes, it would be too confusing to put names to EVERYONE, though he has done is best not to offer sweeping generalisations, but rather put names and faces and lives to those who were in the middle of things. While it would have been easy to go with the majority and dump on the Harrises or Klebolds, Cullen seeks to explore the family dynamics, as well as the lives of these two boys. He pushes into a zone that might have received much fodder already, labelling Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold as psychopaths, but uses much of the medical and psychological analyses to SHOW how these boys fit the bill. They did have psychopathy in them and the key traits were exemplified throughout their lives, even if hindsight was the only way to see it come to the surface. The book is wonderfully paced and pulls the reader in from the start. Topics and chapters move throughout time, though in a way that has much organisation. This is neither a book of excuses or finger pointing, but a thorough analysis of what we, as humans, go through and how there is never a single answer or path to determinations. Media push us around like sheep, but to take the time and examine what is going on around us, we see the nuances and the differences, allowing us to form our own conclusions. I am aware of how odd that sounds, as I place my trust in Cullen here, but that is why I am writing this review; for myself to express what I see from this book. I remain in awe and shock, as I remember the day well, but have come to see that I really knew NOTHING other than what was force fed to me in papers and later stilted documentaries. May those who perished and were injured feel the warmth of many, for you are more than the statistics that surround this event. Pain and loss continue to this day and will surely never completely disappear. However, looking forward, this was a learning experience for everyone touched by it. Blame no individual, for we all play a part in fostering personal sentiments towards or against others. Children are our future and it is they who exemplify what is to come. As Cullen so aptly puts it, the education the world got that chilly April morning is surely more powerful than any line-item in the curriculum. Have we learned from it? I suppose only time will tell!

Kudos, Mr. Cullen for making me see that there is more than meets the eye. Your delivery has me hoping that you will return with more, on any subject, as you have piqued my interest!

Like/hate the review? An ever-growing collection of others appears at:
http://pecheyponderings.wordpress.com/ ...more

flag 142 likes · Like · see review

Aug 09, 2012 Maciek rated it it was ok

Shelves: read-in-2012, reviewed, non-fiction, true-crime

On April 20th, 1999, two students of Columbine High arrived at their school for the last time. They were about to begin what would be known as the deadliest schooting in an American high school, killing one teacher and twelve students. What is less known is that Columbine has originally been planned as a bombing; the pair has left two petrol bombs in the school cafeteria, and positioned themselves outside the entrances so they could shoot possible survivors: it is probable that had the bombs exp ...more

flag 133 likes · Like · see review

Mar 27, 2009 Alisa Kester rated it did not like it

Shelves: school-violence, non-fiction

After reading this book, pen in hand, my copy was so marked up with scrawls and underlining that there might have been a second book written in the margins. I wish I could say it was praise for the author's insight into the Columbine tragedy, but instead it was sheer incredulity at the number of mistakes, lies, and misperceptions Cullen is trying to pass off as truth. If your only exposure to Columbine was watching it unfold live on tv, and then maybe reading a few magazine articles, you will pr After reading this book, pen in hand, my copy was so marked up with scrawls and underlining that there might have been a second book written in the margins. I wish I could say it was praise for the author's insight into the Columbine tragedy, but instead it was sheer incredulity at the number of mistakes, lies, and misperceptions Cullen is trying to pass off as truth. If your only exposure to Columbine was watching it unfold live on tv, and then maybe reading a few magazine articles, you will probably rate this book five stars.

But if you've spent years studying Columbine and other school shootings, if you've read the 12,000+ documents available online (including the witness interviews and the the shooters' journals) you be able to understand how Cullen seems to be deliberately twisting the truth in order to present a neat little explanation that lets nearly everyone off the hook and lets us all feel good about our schools and our society. This entire book is filled with little but speculation, stated as fact, often with nothing whatever to back it up, or to explain why he comes to those conclusions.

Some of the mistakes are minor, such as the tidbit that all the school shooters during the years 1997-1998 were 'white boys'. Most mistakes were a great deal less minor, such as Cullen's repeated assertion that Eric Harris "Got chicks. Lots and lots of chicks", he "had scored with a 23 year old when he was only seventeen" and he "outscored much of the football team". Yet, according to Cullen (and Eric's own journal) Eric died a virgin. Cullen goes on and on about those 'chicks', stamping in his own idea that Eric was hugely popular at Columbine, yet he never manages to explain why, if that was the case, Eric was completely unable to "get any". A better explanation, and one that fits the interviews with those who actually attended Columbine, was that Eric was *not* "ranked just under the football team" in popularity, but was actually near the bottom as far as the pecking order of High School. Another example is where Cullen claims that Eric didn't know that he had been rejected by the Marine recruiter (for being on the drug Luvox). Not only was Eric in the room, when the recruiter said that Luvox "would be a problem" and that Eric "would have to have been off the drug a year before he would join", but Eric also told several of his friends that he had been rejected. Cullen says Eric "had no interest in the Marines", but Eric's journal tells another story: "I would have been a great Marine, it would have given me a chance to be good".

Cullen says "there's no evidence that bullying led to murder". He says that "Neither [Eric or Dylan:] complained about bullies picking on them". This is a completely false assertion. There are many, many eyewitness accounts of them being bullied, there is a video of Dylan being slammed into a locker, and there is this statement, straight from Eric's journal: "Everyone is always making fun of me because of how I look, how **ing weak I am and **, well I will get you all back: ultimate *%ing revenge here." During the shooting, they tell everyone wearing white hats to stand up. Cullen gives this quote, but never bothers to explain that it was the jocks who wore white hats at Columbine. He also leaves out the fact that both boys told victims during the shooting that "this was for all the &*#* you put us through".

Cullen wants us to believe that Eric was simply a psychopath, and that Dylan was his unwilling dupe, despite the fact that IF Eric was (and that's a huge if, since there is too many arguments for him not being a psychopath to list here), it doesn't explain WHY he was a psychopath. He certainly didn't show signs of Juvenile Conduct Disorder growing up, as psychopaths nearly invariably do. By all accounts, Eric was a normal kid, in the beginning. He didn't torture animals or show any other warning signs of a sadistic temperament, according to his friends, teachers, and neighbors. And contrary to the movies, psychopaths are nearly always non-violent and not suicidal. Something happened to Eric and Dylan to make them the way they died. To act out in violent revenge, a person doesn't have to be "psyopathic", he only has to be made to feel as if he is completely worthless, and to have all hope taken away from him. Bullying does this. And at this point, a child will either turn the anger and despair in on himself and commit suicide (as the 11 year old boy did recently) or else, like Eric Harris, he will turn it outward. To say, as Cullen does, that Eric's behavior was a mere accident of birth is to deny everything that we could learn from Columbine. It makes us close our eyes to how we can help other children trapped in this downward spiral of bullying and prevent more violence.

If Cullen intended to "bust the myths of Columbine" by ignoring everything that didn't fit his theory, he did an excellent job, and this book deserves a full five stars. I just feel sorry that for many people, this will be the "truth" they come away believing in. The thirteen who died in Littleton deserve a better memorial than this book. ...more

flag 127 likes · Like · see review

Sep 29, 2018 Matthew rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: 2018, audio, non-fiction, true-crime, library

This is a difficult review to write. Going in, you know the content will be extreme, controversial, and upsetting. While that was the case it was also quite eye opening. As the book gets into the details of the massacre (before, during, and after), it is going to be a difficult book for many. But, the depth which the author explores this event is very important in order to clear up all of the details and set the record straight. I think true crime fans will be enthralled with this book.

The bigge This is a difficult review to write. Going in, you know the content will be extreme, controversial, and upsetting. While that was the case it was also quite eye opening. As the book gets into the details of the massacre (before, during, and after), it is going to be a difficult book for many. But, the depth which the author explores this event is very important in order to clear up all of the details and set the record straight. I think true crime fans will be enthralled with this book.

The biggest thing I took from this is it is bad to jump to conclusions and you should not let fiction become fact. Going in, I thought I knew the basics surrounding the tragedy, but it turns out that a lot of what I thought I knew is wrong. Seeing how once the event began, the population was hungry for answers and the chain of information became like a giant game of telephone and what often ended up in print or on TV is far from the truth. In fact, the author did so good of a job making this point, I am wondering if I should be skeptical of him, too! He has me paranoid!

This was the first time I have ever heard or read in depth the details following the event. The success stories, the additional tragedies, the rebuilding, and the healing we're all very facinating. One story in particular where the Evangelical Church tried to benefit of the tragedy was disappointing. While it sounds like they thought their heart was in the right place, they we're pushing too hard for martyrs and new followers and their hope to find the silver lining was lost in the static.

So much about the "why?" and "what can we do?" is touched on in this book. You will be amazed at how much life in this suburban Colorado town sounds like any town and the kids (both victims and killers) are just like many teenagers you might know. But, it is also amazing to watch the dark side grow inside the mind of a killer while leaving things fairly normal (maybe a little rebellious) on the surface. What do you do? What can you do? How do you know?

A very captivating book. Well written and informative. Proceed with caution if you are sensitive to violence and graphic details. ...more

flag 135 likes · Like · see review

Apr 20, 2009 Matt rated it really liked it

Shelves: true-crime, non-fiction, journalism

I was a senior in high school on April 20, 1999. I thought the same thoughts as every other student in the country: could it happen here? who among my classmates are potential threats? what would I do?

The Columbine Massacre remains the most famous school shooting in history. It goes beyond body counts. It wasn't the first shooting, it wasn't the last, and after Virginia Tech, it isn't the worst. Something about it, though, stands out. It marked an evolution in youth violence - a horrible meldin ...more

flag 101 likes · Like · see review

Jul 28, 2019 Greta G rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: owned-in-english, ebook, this-is-america, non-fiction

Godlike emotions

Eric and Dylan were just kids. Something or someone must have led them astray.
The parents, the Harrises and Klebolds, were the chief suspects.
Virtually all the early news stories were infested with erroneous assumptions and comically wrong conclusions.
All sorts of culprits contributing to the tragedy sprang to life incredibly fast: violent movies, video games, Goth culture, bullies, satan, a gay conspiracy, racism, Christians, Hitler’s birthday, Marilyn Manson. Stories were ci ...more

flag 101 likes · Like · see review

Feb 14, 2016 Dem rated it really liked it

Recommended to Dem by: caroline

I had to constantly remind myself while reading Columbine that this was Not Fiction.

I vaguely remember hearing about this massacre on the news back in the late 1990s but this has made me realise how little attention I pay to media reports as only while reading this book did I realise how devastating and shocking April 20th was for a whole community of people in Colorado.

On 20th April 1999 Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold drove to their school, planted two bombs and took up stance outside the entra I had to constantly remind myself while reading Columbine that this was Not Fiction.

I vaguely remember hearing about this massacre on the news back in the late 1990s but this has made me realise how little attention I pay to media reports as only while reading this book did I realise how devastating and shocking April 20th was for a whole community of people in Colorado.

On 20th April 1999 Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold drove to their school, planted two bombs and took up stance outside the entrance door to the school in order to shoot fleeing students. The bombs failed but the massacre that these boys inflicted on their fellow students and their families and communities will never be forgotten.
This book paints a very vivid account of before and after the shootings and the author Dave cullen was one of the Colorado journalists covering the story as it unfolded and he certainly seems to have done his research when putting this book together.

At first I was disappointed the there was an absence of photos in the Book but the more I read the more I realized the book didn't need them, the only image is the photo on the cover of the actural school and I didn't even bother googling images of Harris or Klebold until I had finished the book.

As a mother who does the school run every day, it is the last thing on my mind that something of this nature could every possibly occur in my sugar coated little world and this book really made me sit up and take notice. I was shocked at how these two boys could plan and bring about such devastation without their families or friends finding out about their plans.
I felt so sorry for all the families involved and the whole community as how do you put the like of this behind you. I also felt for the families of Harris and Klebold as no parent brings up their kids to become monsters like these two. I am so aware while writing this review that so many of the students, teachers, families, and wider community will spend their lives trying to come to terms with what happened on April 20th and no amount of books will right the wrongs of that day or even begin to expalin to those involved why.

This is a very detailed account of the massare at Comumbine and some readers may find it perhaps too detailed and difficult to read. Its an extremely well researched and well written book and while I found it difficult reading it is certainly informative and an eye opener. Not a book I am likely to forget in a hurry. ...more

flag 82 likes · Like · see review

Mar 13, 2017 Mariah Roze rated it it was amazing

I have been wanting to read this book ever since it went through my newsfeed on Goodreads and boy, did this book not disappoint! This was a phenomenal story. It was well written and researched!

This book was about explaining what happened on April 20, 1999; the start for the next two decades of school shooting. It was informative in telling that most of the information that we have been told about Columbine had been wrong. It wasn't about jocks, Goths, or the Trench Coat Mafia. Dave Cullen- the a ...more

flag 68 likes · Like · see review

Aug 23, 2010 Stephen rated it really liked it

Shelves: ebooks, true-crime, 2006-2010, audiobook, history-usa

4.0 stars. This poignant, extremely well done true crime/history takes a comprehensive look at the Columbine massacre. As a rule, I do not read a lot of true crime stories or follow too closely these kinds of national tragedies when they occur (I just find it too depressing). Thus, before I picked up this book, my knowledge of the events surrounding Columbine was limited to “headlines” and “10 minute news segments” that dealt with very little beyond the surface of the shooting.

This award winnin 4.0 stars. This poignant, extremely well done true crime/history takes a comprehensive look at the Columbine massacre. As a rule, I do not read a lot of true crime stories or follow too closely these kinds of national tragedies when they occur (I just find it too depressing). Thus, before I picked up this book, my knowledge of the events surrounding Columbine was limited to “headlines” and “10 minute news segments” that dealt with very little beyond the surface of the shooting.

This award winning book written in 2009 is widely considered the definitive study of the Columbine shooting and follows two distinct narrative tracks. First, it details the lives of the two shooters, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, from several years before the shooting, through the planning of the attack and the eventual consummation of the murders on April 20, 1999. The second storyline follows a group of survivors and their families from right before the shooting through the aftermath over the next ten years. The book is structured so that the chapters alternate between the two story-lines which I thought was very effective.

The survivors storyline would itself make an interesting book as it chronicles the significant and permanent changes wrought on a small town community in the wake of a major tragedy. These include discussions of the following: (1) the numerous lawsuits stemming from law enforcement’s handling of the shooting (including an alleged cover-up regarding destruction of evidence); (2) fundamentalist religious movements using the “myth” of one of the victims professing her love for God right before being killed as a “rallying cry” for their members (I say myth because the book details how the event was later discovered never to have happened); (3) the battle between local leaders and the National Rifle Association when the NRA was scheduled to have their annual conference in Columbine shortly after the massacre and would not cancel the event; and (4) the radically different path that the survivors and their families lives followed after the shooting (both inspiring and tragic). All of these stories were extremely well researched and very deftly handled by the author who left me with the feeling that he truly cared about the material about which he was writing.

As interesting and important as the above narrative track was, the story of Eric and Dylan and their road to the massacre was what I found the most compelling (as well as deeply disturbing). Through the detailed journals and home made videos of the two boys, we are given an inside look into two very disturbed minds. This is especially true in the case of Eric Harris who, as I mention below, was an actual SOCIOPATH (yes like Dahmer, Gacy and Bundy). I found these sections to be ABSOLUTELY RIVETING. It is in telling the story of these two boys that the author explodes many of the “myths” surrounding the Columbine massacre that I think many people still believe (I know I did before I read this).

MYTH #1: The Columbine Massacre was the result of the killers being bullied and was directed against the jocks and popular kids at the school. TRUTH: The massacre was orchestrated by Eric Harris (more on him below) who was smart, popular and of average looks. Neither of the two shooters were subjected to bullying or abuse as their journals (discovered after the shooting) make clear.

MYTH #2: The Columbine Massacre was perpetrated by basically decent kids who were simply deeply “troubled” depressed and suicidal. TRUTH: Dylan Klebold fits this image and while he can not be considered a victim by any stretch of the imagination, he was “recruited” by Eric Harris to help him with the massacre. Eric Harris, on the other hand WAS A PSYCHOPATH PURE AND SIMPLE. He was a real life younger version of Patrick Bateman from American Psycho who wanted nothing more than to conduct the greatest mass murder in American History. Through Eric’s detailed and extraordinarily disturbing journals and home made videos, we see a person with all of the traits of a classic, sadistic sociopath including, (a) a calm, controlled exterior; (b)someone who is extremely manipulative and able to convince people of almost anything; (c) being totally without empathy or any strong emotional feelings; (d) a complete inability to feel any guilt or remorse and (e) believing himself superior to the entire world which (in his words) didn’t deserve to even live.

MYTH #3: The Columbine killers had “target” lists of specific people they intended to kill. TRUTH: The Columbine massacre was not even intended to be a “shooting.” The killers intended to “blow up” the school and use the guns only to kill stragglers who survived the initial blast. They set up home-made pipe bombs that were planted around the school cafeteria and set to go off at a precise moment when the cafeteria would be the most crowded. One of their goals was to kill more people than the Oklahoma bombing of 1995 and they had no specific targets in mind. Fortunately, the bombs did not go off which is why this fact is not as well known.

Overall, I found this to be a fascinating and book and a disturbing look inside the mind of a teenage killer. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!! ...more

flag 69 likes · Like · see review

Apr 22, 2010 Greg rated it really liked it

Shelves: kookey-kristians, libraries, life-is-shit, myths-legends, true-crime

1. Last night I googled "Eric Harris Columbine", I was curious what the little monster looked like. He looked so average and normal, no wonder I hadn't remembered what he looked like from the incessant news coverage 11 years ago. One can see pictures of him and Dylan Kebold dead in the library from at least two different angles in google images. Apparently some people believe that there is still more to the Columbine story, that something else happened to two boys to make this happen.

2. I've re ...more

flag 62 likes · Like · see review

Mar 29, 2013 Paquita Maria Sanchez added it

Shelves: actuals-n-factuals, best-in-show

I have to hand it to you, April. You truly know how to test human endurance. After my usual routine of blasting NPR all week at work while entering data, I decided yesterday that I had well beyond reached my horror, disgust, frustration, and doomsday-fears capacity, shut off the station, plugged up my ears, and listened to 69 Love Songs and múm's discography all the way through instead. Despite the fact that I keyed in the date hundreds of times, it never crossed my mind what the symbol I was re I have to hand it to you, April. You truly know how to test human endurance. After my usual routine of blasting NPR all week at work while entering data, I decided yesterday that I had well beyond reached my horror, disgust, frustration, and doomsday-fears capacity, shut off the station, plugged up my ears, and listened to 69 Love Songs and múm's discography all the way through instead. Despite the fact that I keyed in the date hundreds of times, it never crossed my mind what the symbol I was repeatedly creating actually stands for in the context of my lifetime. April 19th, April 19th, April 19th. Only once I arrived home and was halfway through my all-nighter read of the last 1/3rd of this book did the light-bulb illuminating reality decide to flicker back on, and I realized my disturbingly appropriate timing. I finished reading Dave Cullen's sobering journalistic piece on the Columbine Massacre in the early morning hours of the 14th anniversary of the Columbine Massacre. Not just that, but I had spent the entire previous evening typing in the 20 year anniversary date of the siege at Waco, and the 18th year after the Murrah bombing. And I grew up in Oklahoma City. The world is currently so chaotic that I completely blanked on all the other major tragedies I had grown up around, and even seen firsthand. Jaded, or simply overwhelmed by the flood of refuse we have recently been forced to swim through, I don't like the idea that so much misery could slip from memory so easily. However, I know am not alone in forgetting. As Cullen points out, not one change was made to gun laws in the wake of Columbine. People just...moved on to other things.

Of course, leeway regarding my temporary amnesia is a given considering the events of the last week, nay, the last year or so. I did, however, realize beforehand that my eyes had stopped on and selected this title on my bookshelf due to the recent resurgence of futile debates centering on gun control in the United States. It felt like an appropriate time to revisit this many times since trumped tragedy, as it seems to be the point where the world really began to notice what was already an epidemic of glorification of and widespread access to semiautomatic weapons in this country. No, I do not wish to debate this matter. I don't want to take your gun away. I do, however, think popular opinion regarding things like background checks and the future sale of military-grade assault weapons to civilians has made its voice well known, and in a shout, at that. Regardless, it doesn't really matter what I think anyway. Apparently, it doesn't even matter one whit what most of us think. In the weeks before the shooting in Colorado, Eric Harris wrote in his journal to lament the existence of background checks in his state, then went on to examine the Brady Bill in detail, eventually celebrating all the loopholes present for gun shows. The semiautomatic rifle and two shotguns used by the killers would, as a result, come from gun shows. Interpret and respond to that information however you will. Again, it won't matter.

There are a few distinct items that I would like to address about this book which form a sort of trinity of deception and misconception concerning the event, much of which is still popular, though indisputably refuted, belief regarding the hows and whys. When Cullen is at his most fierce, he is taking on the Media's misleading and exploitative coverage, the law enforcement cover-ups of their own ineptitude via literal document-shredding combined with the revealing information they "protected" us from for years after the massacre, and the Church's non-stop capitalizing on the inevitable shock and aftershock. Having been in high school during the shooting, it is not a faint memory. We all remember a few things about the tragedy: the boys who did this were social outcasts. The boys who did this targeted "jocks" and "popular kids." One girl pronounced her love of God just before being executed, thereby becoming a modern-day martyr. It was presented as a classic good vs. evil, wholesome vs. strange, God vs. The Devil dichotomy of humanity. Oh, and the media ate it up. The Jefferson County Sheriff's Department allowed it to swell to a frenzy of widely-embraced misinformation, despite striking amounts of (classified, naturally) hard evidence to the contrary. The Church used it as a recruitment tool, at times callously reveling in their good fortune in the aftermath of the tragedy. A perfect storm of nonsense rained down.

The facts? Cassie Bernall was not the girl who professed her Christianity, despite what the Church and publishers of her biography will have you believe even to this day. The real source of this pronouncement of faith did not die, and the last word Cassie Bernall heard before being shot in the head was not "God," but "peekaboo." The killers were not social outcasts, were not part of the high school "goth" clique known as "The Trench Coat Mafia," their targets were not specific and retribution-based, but rather: blind, indiscriminate. Their aim was maximum carnage, the highest possible body count. Both boys came from stable, supportive two-parent homes. They were not bullied, they didn't listen to Marilyn Manson or worship Satan, they were not isolated from or ridiculed by their peers any more than every other high schooler endures at one point or another. Dylan Klebold attended his prom two days before the shooting. Eric Harris had a belt on which were many notches, and his female schoolmates widely considered him desirable. These were not vengeful weirdos, but a certifiable psychopath and the suicidal depressive who clung to the former's shadow for sustenance. The emotionally void alpha and the over-emotioned and erratic submissive, each on his own quest for death: one to die in infamy, the other simply to die.

Cullen's narrative, though presented in a nonlinear fashion, manages to lay out a timeline for the events, to examine the real, inevitably complex psychology behind the tragedy, and to debunk the entire, entirely false widespread memory that is the events of April 20th, 1999. Considering the facts, and by that I mean the real facts, can be terrifying. I understand why a lot of people would love to believe that simple things like anti-bullying programs or church camp could work to prevent another such shooting. Of course, those of us who have been paying attention know beyond a shadow of a doubt that things have only gotten worse since Klebold and Harris took their own lives. The simple fact is that two neurologically impaired juvenile felons were allowed ready access to high-powered weaponry designed for battlefields, making a warzone of their own high school, and because of, well, nothing really. The inanity alone is maddening. The true causes are no sources of comfort, but it is crucial that we as a society force ourselves to face them, and to take the appropriate precautionary steps, particularly regarding the availability of frighteningly effective means to spree kill. Especially now. Right now. Turn on your television and then tell me you don't at least see my point. ...more

flag 55 likes · Like · see review

Jan 17, 2013 Stephanie *Eff your feelings* rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 2013, non-fiction

(02-15-18) I originally wrote this review in 2013 and I thought this would be a good day to bump it up into the feed. When I re-read this, I squelched the urge to rewrite any of it (Which I will do...after I cringe at what I had written.) because I did want to preserve what I was feeling at the time. In fact, I totally forgot I even wrote this. If you have the time, read the comments...that’s where the most interesting stuff happens. It’s unbelievable what has happened to this country in the pas (02-15-18) I originally wrote this review in 2013 and I thought this would be a good day to bump it up into the feed. When I re-read this, I squelched the urge to rewrite any of it (Which I will do...after I cringe at what I had written.) because I did want to preserve what I was feeling at the time. In fact, I totally forgot I even wrote this. If you have the time, read the comments...that’s where the most interesting stuff happens. It’s unbelievable what has happened to this country in the past five years.

Also, I want to put an article that I read today that I find fascinating and completely depressing.....Cheers!

https://eand.co/why-were-underestimat...

Original review.....

April 20th 1999 was a Tuesday. I remember this fact because my day off was Tuesday. I was probably doing some laundry and cleaning with the TV on in the background. Then I remember stopping and watching as the news came across the TV. There had been a school shooting......a bad one. My first thought was "bad things always happen on Tuesdays."

Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed 13 and injured 24. Eric was the mastermind behind the massacre and young psychopath. Dylan was depressed, seemingly a bipolar individual. Eric planned the day extensively for a couple of years and they both documented everything with journals and videos. These were used by the author who did a fantastic bit of journalism with this book.

There was so much more to what happened than we were told. This wasn't supposed to be a shooting, or at least not just a shooting, Eric had a vision of total destruction. The two had planted bombs in the school inside duffle bags as well as in their cars. The bombs were designed to kill 500 people. Eric wanted to kill everyone and thankfully he failed to figure out how to detonate his bombs. So Eric and Dylan were forced to use their guns instead, guns they could only get at a gun show.

David Cullen a reporter on the scene April 20th 1999 made it his mission to learn everything there was to learn about this tragedy. He spent the next ten years doing just that with this book being the result. Columbine not only takes us into the minds of the killers but into police cover-ups on prior incidents with Eric and Dylan and how glaringly obvious it was that they were going to do very bad things. It follows up on the families of the victims and what has become of them over the years.

A bit of a personal rant here. I am not a gun fan. If I had my way I'd melt every last one of them down. I know this isn't a terribly popular opinion in this country but it is how I feel. I don't understand the love affair many people in the United States have with these things designed for nothing but destruction. I know that melting down all the guns won't happen (yet), but I do believe we have to start coming up with some strong regulations to stop future Eric-s and Dylan-s, James-s and Adam-s. Because no matter their mental state, their killings would not have been possible if they didn't have access to an arsenal.

After reading Columbine I came to another conclusion. Every parent needs to go through their kids personal stuff. Screw privacy. I can't figure out how these two guys could have amassed the fire power and bomb makings, video taped themselves and wrote the whole plan out in journals in their parents houses and their parents didn't know! They were basically screaming "I am going to kill as many people as I can!!"

I would be one nosy, annoying mom if I had any children.....boy would they hate me and I wouldn't care. ...more

flag 47 likes · Like · see review

Feb 03, 2010 Caroline rated it it was amazing

Recommends it for: Lovers of true crime stories; those who want to know everything about the Columbine tragedy

Shelves: maximum-impact, nonfiction, page-turner, narrative-nonfiction, true-crime, he-wrote-it, favorites, memorable-characters, important-nonfiction, edgar-award-winner-or-nominee

Absolutely mesmerizing from start to finish. Columbine is a spell-binding true crime that is the very embodiment of "page-turner." Cullen is a brilliant researcher and writer who has written the last word on the Columbine High School massacre of April 20, 1999.

Update: October 2, 2013. Columbine made Charles Graeber's Top 10 True Crime Books: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013...

Update: August 15, 2014. Readers wanting to explore the subject of psychopathy (which Cullen discusses) further oug ...more

flag 44 likes · Like · see review

Feb 27, 2019 Elyse Walters rated it it was amazing

Shelves: history, mystery-thriller-crime, non-fiction

I read this book shortly after - reading “A Mother’s Reckoning”.. Living in the Aftermath of a Tragedy ...by Sue Klebold

I owned this book years before reading it - it had been passed to me by a neighbor-
but by the time I did read it .... I found it more complete - and easier to take in - than in than Sue Klebold’s book. It was almost anti-climatic by the time I read it ...
But what stood out was how much I admired the author!!! How much more I learned ....

So many of emotions were stirred - in Su ...more

flag 41 likes · Like · see review

Apr 03, 2009 Tamora Pierce rated it it was amazing

Shelves: nonfiction-crime

This is the first complete coverage of the 1999 Columbine high school shooting that's been published, with information on the journals and videotapes seized by the police, on the survivors and their families, on the political changes in the town, on the school before and after. It debunks the jock revenge and heavy metal theories that the media generated in the information vacuum after the shootings and gives the information that proves there was no conspiracy.

I was disappointed at first by the ...more

flag 38 likes · Like · see review

Mar 22, 2011 jv poore rated it it was amazing

Shelves: bullying, adolescence, hate_crime, own-it, survival-stories, non-fiction, friendship

Relevant upon release, this book is imperative right now.

flag 38 likes · Like · see review

Jul 31, 2017 Britany rated it really liked it

Shelves: non-fiction, mmd, 2017

The moment the shooting at Columbine happened would be a moment that I would never forget. It would alter the way I experienced school and it would break the safe bubble of invincibility I always thought that I had. I was in 8th grade on April 20, 1999 getting ready to graduate from middle school and walk across the shared campus to high school. I was young and impressionable and the circumstances and media reporting on this event was absorbed differently than it was for future school shooting e The moment the shooting at Columbine happened would be a moment that I would never forget. It would alter the way I experienced school and it would break the safe bubble of invincibility I always thought that I had. I was in 8th grade on April 20, 1999 getting ready to graduate from middle school and walk across the shared campus to high school. I was young and impressionable and the circumstances and media reporting on this event was absorbed differently than it was for future school shooting events. Honestly, I had my own storyline of events for this shooting and was hazy on the specific details. The one thing that always stood out on my mind was who the shooters were-- Dylan Klebold & Eric Harris-- and for that, I'm forever disappointed that I couldn't name a single victim (and there were 13!) but without even pausing I could tell you who the shooters were.

I had this book on my radar for a long time and finally cracked it open for a book club pick. I was finally ready to find out what really happened, what I thought I knew-- turns out was QUITE different. Misconceptions about this event were rampant (and this was prior to the 24 hour news cycle) mostly these were perpetrated by the media.

The first 100 pages torn me apart- shred by shred; page by page. My heart broke open a thousand times reading the accounts of these victims and the sadness that enveloped the school so quickly. I wasn't sure I would be able to get through the whole book and in what condition. That quickly dissipated once I moved onto the part 2. Dave Cullen removed himself as a journalist throughout the narrative (I enjoyed seeing when he inserted himself through the notes). He effortlessly tells the story of Eric & Dylan- their downward spiral and the elaborate plans that they created. He weaves their stories with the harrowing last minutes of the victims. Dave Sanders for me was the one that stole my whole heart. I was horrified to read how long he held on only to bleed out 3-1/2 hours later because the police were more concerned about securing the perimeter. Meanwhile, Patrick Ireland was jumping out of the window-- anxiously trying to escape. For me, these two particular story lines took this book to another level for me.

The only downside to this book was that not all the victims were represented-- they all didn't get space in Mr. Cullen's book and I am not sure why some of these stories were left out. Also, for whatever reason- I never got back to the emotional level of those first crucial hundred pages.

Thank you for setting my personal record of this event straight, Mr Cullen. I was wrong on so many levels and wasn't aware of the rest of the many issues stemming from this event. For me, Columbine will never be forgotten. ...more

flag 4 likes · Like · see review

Jun 29, 2009 Kim rated it really liked it

Shelves: goodread-authors, gr-friend-recommendations, holy-shit, mmx, contemporary, rubbernecking

About and around 19 years ago, I used to go to TT’s in Cambridge, MA on Mondays for Stone Soup Poetry. Maurice used to read during open mike and Brother Blue would perform and after awhile you’d get to know all the ‘regulars’---There was the really cute quiet guy who totally copped the beatnik look and would madly scribble in his notebook while others performed--only to shatter on stage. I’m talking complete, make-yourself-hoarse kind of raging, spitting his words out, knocking down chairs… Quit ...more

flag 33 likes · Like · see review

Apr 20, 2009 Diane rated it it was amazing

Shelves: sociology-psychology, nonfiction, true-crime

This was the best nonfiction book I read in 2009, and it's an incredible piece of journalism. A lot of media attention was given to the mass shootings at Columbine High School in Colorado on April 20, 1999, but so many of the details that were reported in those first few weeks were dead wrong. This book shattered all the things I thought I knew about the Columbine shootings. For example, it didn't have anything to do with jocks, gays, bullies, the Trench Coat Mafia or Marilyn Manson.

Eric Harris This was the best nonfiction book I read in 2009, and it's an incredible piece of journalism. A lot of media attention was given to the mass shootings at Columbine High School in Colorado on April 20, 1999, but so many of the details that were reported in those first few weeks were dead wrong. This book shattered all the things I thought I knew about the Columbine shootings. For example, it didn't have anything to do with jocks, gays, bullies, the Trench Coat Mafia or Marilyn Manson.

Eric Harris was a psychopath who had actually planned a massive school bombing -- not just a shooting -- and his ultimate fantasy was to kill all mankind. None of his big bombs at the school worked (thank god) but he and Dylan Klebold continued with the mass shootings. The author thinks Dylan was depressed and just wanted to commit suicide, but he had been conscripted into Eric's plan.

Dave Cullen researched and reported on Columbine for nine years. The book starts a few days before the shootings, but chapters also cover the years leading up to the massacre, so you see how the boys gradually arrived at their plan for murder.

This book was especially meaningful to me because I was working as a video editor at a TV station on April 20, 1999. I remember one of the producers saying, "Uh, something's going on in Colorado. The AP wire is going nuts."

I spent the rest of my day watching the incoming video footage, and then I had to edit it for the evening newscasts. For several months after Columbine, I couldn't watch movies with any violence in them -- I had become nauseated from the real thing.

I didn't realize how haunting those images were until the 10-year anniversary of the shootings, and all that footage was replayed. Watching Patrick Ireland fall out of the library window again and again and again was like a god-awful movie on cable that just kept being rerun.

At least now, I better understand why it all happened.

And to anyone who instantly blames the parents of the kids, I would say that you should read this book before you start judging. Eric's father was very strict and tried to discipline him. The problem is that psychopaths may be beyond help or redemption. I felt sympathy for the parents after reading this book, and empathized with the guilt and grief and anger that they must have gone through.

I highly recommend the book to anyone who loves good narrative nonfiction or who has an interest in the psychopathy of criminals. Those interested in law enforcement would also appreciate the book, because this was the case that drastically changed the way officers handled mass shooters. ...more

flag 33 likes · Like · see review

Apr 11, 2017 Jonetta rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction, audiobook, nc-br-digital-library, 17000-in-2017, 4000-books

I recently read Sue Klebold's A Mother's Reckoning: Living in the Aftermath of Tragedy, which is outstanding, so I thought it best to listen to a definitive account of not only what happened at Columbine but also objective analyses of the two shooters, Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris. Sue made some assertions about Eric Harris and her son that made me wonder if these were her perceptions or those widely shared. Thankfully, this story supports so much of what she shared in her story so my opinion o ...more

flag 35 likes · Like · see review

Jun 25, 2009 Sarah rated it really liked it

This book was not easy to read (or listen to, in my case). But it is incredibly informative, if you can get past the emotional aspect. Such an intense experience, but really, really well done.

flag 29 likes · Like · see review

Jun 01, 2009 Jim rated it it was amazing

Shelves: politics-and-society, non-fiction, police-and-thieves

If you only read one book on the Columbine massacre, this should be the one. Cullen has devoted almost ten years of research to the subject and cuts through the crap that has grown up around the tragedy and the two boys who committed the crimes. It makes for depressing reading, but it is highly readable despite that.

The widely held picture of Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold is of a pair of angry loners, the products of parental neglect, who were bullied at school and who killed out of revenge. Cul If you only read one book on the Columbine massacre, this should be the one. Cullen has devoted almost ten years of research to the subject and cuts through the crap that has grown up around the tragedy and the two boys who committed the crimes. It makes for depressing reading, but it is highly readable despite that.

The widely held picture of Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold is of a pair of angry loners, the products of parental neglect, who were bullied at school and who killed out of revenge. Cullen shows that this portrait is mostly a product of journalists and authorities grasping at easy explanations and (in the authorities' case) rationalizing breathtaking incompetence.

The facts are that the boys were relatively popular, smart kids, with loving parents. They could be odd, capable of over-the-top behavior (but what teenager isn't). Everyone assumed that they would be going to college in the next year. They both attended prom. In a lot of ways, they didn't seem too different from other troubled kids who somehow manage to lurch their way through adolesence.

But there were differences. Psychologists would determine that Harris was a psychopath, largely incapable of feeling empathy or compassion. Like all psychopaths, he had a huge sense of superiority over others, seeing people as having no value. Generally, he kept control of his emotions, but he could quickly become angry when things didn't go exactly his way. Like all psychopaths, he was extremely manipulative, charming people to get his way.

Klebold, a kid with an incredibly negative sense of self was a follower who was ready to be manipulated. Where Harris was calculating, Klebold was overly emotional. He was obsessed with love but was convinced that he would never be loved in turn. Friends and friends' parents liked Klebold. Still, it was obvious that he had his problems. He was an extreme depressive with a great deal of inwardly-directed rage and an obsession with suicide. Sometimes, that rage would be directed outward, and that's what Harris worked on.

Cullen pulls no punches when it comes to describing the ways both boys came to commit mass murder. He describes their troubled (and troubling) inner lives without using this as an excuse for their actions. In all, the author is very even-handed. He doesn't try to make a moral tale out of his story, but he doesn't shy away from placing blame.

Aside from the perpetrators, Cullen directs a lot of that blame at the police for their actions, both before and after the incident. (A police acquaintance of mine at the time said that authorities in Columbine had pretty much done everything wrong.) The sheriff's department, which had primary jurisdiction, treated the incident as a hostage situation; however, the shooters had no intention of taking hostages, as was fairly evident from their conduct at the time. This mischaracterization led police to handle the situation in the wrong way. Even though a police liason officer was present near the start of the killings, he chose to take cover and call for back-up, then stayed behind his car. The shooters were allowed to have the run of the school for almost 30 minutes before SWAT teams were allowed to move in.

The sheriff's department began its cover-up even as SWAT teams were still searching the school. The sheriff shifted blame onto the killers' parents, onto the school administration, onto secular American culture. What the sheriff didn't say was that his department already knew of Harris's potential for violence. He had been involved in increasingly serious crimes and several public complaints had been filed against him. Police were aware that he had been making his own bombs and that he had made death threats.

The full extent of the killers' twisted inner lives would be revealed in the aftermath of the massacre, when authorities would have access to the extensive journals, videos, and online postings Harris and Klebold had produced, setting forth their world views. In their respective journals, Klebold was obsessed with his own personal extinction, Harris with the extinction of all humanity. A lot of this was known to the sheriff's department, which chose to ignore it. Ultimately, it would take repeated judicial orders to make this information public.

News media also shares a lot of blame for the long-held misunderstanding of what went on. The 24-hour news cycle's drve for immediate and constant information led reporters to settle for rumors and snap judgements, rather than digging for hard facts. (Not for the first or last time.) TV journalism's propensity to seek easy explanations led to the characterization of the killers as goths, victims of bullies, video game obsessives, neo-Nazis, etc. A lot of misinformation grew out of early coverage and took hold as "reliable" information. Some of it was at least partly true, but much of it was false.

Cullen has procuced a remarkable work of reportage. The story is absolutely gripping. Often, books about crime go for shock, dwelling on the lurid aspects, playing up blood and gore and death of innocents for emotional impact. Cullen does not stoop to this. He is very matter-of-fact about the events he describes, allowing the story to tell itself.

He does an excellent job of recounting events in the school during the massacre, as well as describing the minds of the perpetrators, but he goes well beyond this. Cullen writes about the anguish of the Klebolds as they came to terms with what their son had done. (The Harrises have refused to give interviews.) He also explores the different ways survivors and loved ones dealt with the aftermath, how some people came to forgiveness and others cultivated and channeled their anger.

After Columbine, schools got serious about being proactive and averting this potential nightmare. Almost every school in the country has an emergency plan based on what people think are the "lessons of Columbine." As Cullen points out, however, many of these are false lessons. (Anyone who has paid attention to accounts of schools expelling students for nail-clipper possession or overreacting to a violent fictional story turned in by a creative writing student will realize the results of these false lessons.) Hopefully, my fellow educators will read this book and think about it. ...more

flag 28 likes · Like · see review

May 06, 2019 Meike rated it really liked it

Shelves: usa, 2019-read

Columbine: Two heavily armed students go on a killing spree because they were bullied and ostracized, so they set out to take revenge against the jocks and all the other popular kids. Except that's not what actually happened. Dave Cullen's investigative book shines when he dissects how the tragedy was portrayed by different sides and why: The police tried to cover up that they had gotten hints regarding Eric Harris, one of the perptetrators, for over a year; the media has the duty to inform and ...more

flag 28 likes · Like · see review

Jun 22, 2020 Jess☺️ rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: true-crime

Columbine by Dave Cullen is such a heartbreaking book, but it will also make you extremely angery too.
I can't believe this was 21 years ago I can still remember watching this on the news and sitting with friends thinking how the hell can two young boys our age do something like this.
Answer: one narcissistic psychopath and one extremely manic depressive who just wanted a way out (I'm sorry to say this but I'm pretty sure he could of just delt with it himself without harming others)
This book open ...more

flag 26 likes · Like · see review

« previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 … next »

new topic
Discuss This Book

topics	posts	views	last activity
Non Fiction Book ...: Columbine (February 15 - Apr 30, 2020)	31	30	Mar 20, 2020 04:57AM
Bookworm Bitches : September 2019: Columbine	7	61	Oct 13, 2019 04:44PM
YA Buddy Readers'...: Columbine by Dave Cullen - Starting September 3rd 2019	22	24	Sep 22, 2019 06:01AM
Huntsville-Madiso...: Staff Pick - Columbine by Dave Cullen	1	9	Jul 01, 2018 02:11PM

Readers also enjoyed

See similar books…

Videos About This Book

Why the Columbine massacre? Trailer outlines killers' motives

1 comment

Genres

Nonfiction

3,381 users

Crime > True Crime

1,857 users

History

766 users

Mystery > Crime

513 users

Audiobook

212 users

Psychology

187 users

Writing > Journalism

114 users

Sociology

98 users

Adult

96 users

Biography

89 users

See top shelves…

About Dave Cullen

Dave Cullen

53,947 followers

Dave Cullen has been covering the blight of mass murders in America for two decades, first with COLUMBINE, now PARKLAND: BIRTH OF A MOVEMENT. COLUMBINE was a New York Times bestseller and the consensus definitive account. Parkland is a story of hope: the genesis of the extraordinary March for Our Lives movement. Dave was with the students from the beginning, with unparalleled access behind the sce ...more