Rating: 
Summary: Should be required reading
Review: This book both fascinates and repluses at the same time. Fascinates in the story telling. Repluses with the actions of lots of people in the administration, especially John Ashcroft, and their assult on our civil liberties in the name of "protection".
Rating:
Summary: For those not looking for a sensationalist version of 9/11
Review: This book follows everyday people, key political figures, and various other business and charity organizers and shows how their lives changed in the days, weeks, months and year after 9/11. What starts to emerge from a thoughtful reading of this book is that it reflects Americans and the United States in all its strengths and all its weaknesses. The people described and the country is not perfect, but the issues and pressures that are faced hour by hour, day by day, etcetera is truly remarkable. There is constant give and take as differing idealogies and philosophies of the freedom America should bring is played out, but in fast forward. Decisions, bills (both those needing to be paid and ones on Capitol Hill), opportunities, and obstacles come up and are dealt with, for better or worse in retrospect. The only 9/11 book that comes close to this sort of balanced and careful analysis, albeit still early in the history of the post 9/11 era, is Inside 9/11 by the editors of Der Spiegel.
Rating: 
Summary: detailed... but accurate?
Review: This book is a perfect example of the saying among journalists, "don't let the facts get in the way of a good story." Brill approached this book with an agenda and stuck with it. He made heros out of some and scorned others. One of the best examples is his praise for the two Border Patrol agents in Detroit who used their union positions and union agenda to provide their opinion of the state of border control. Some, including myself, who call this providing aid to the enemy. Brill--in his hatred for BP and INS supervisors, and who just might be looking at the big picture of border control--labeled them heros. But don't be fooled, Brill hardly spared anyone except for those he himself decided were worthy. The book has moments that are interesting, but be prepared for a long, hard read. The nuggets are few and the mundane detail is plenty. A more tightly written book, perhaps a couple of hundred pages less, would improve this book greatly. My recommendation: borrow it if you have time to kill, but don't buy it.
Rating:
Summary: Emblematic Idiocy
Review: This sentimental tripe is part of a new genre of patriotic non-fiction which reads as convincingly as a Soviet-era pamphlet describing the overwhelming success of the latest five-year plan. It's 700 pages worth of unabashed, biased praise for programs which are largely unimplemented, a confirmation that the corporations who made grabs for government cash were doing it purely in the sense of public service, and an attempt to jerk tears for the sacrifices of "ordinary" folks like John Ashcroft and Tom Ridge. If you decide to suffer through this, you'll likely note an absense of the kind of "on the other hand" criticism typically present in such a voluminous work. Item by item, case by case, the book touts the great accomplishments of almost every neoconservative public official and makes countless attempts to identify them with the ordinary American (who is much more likely to be recognized in a small town in Texas than in a big city, and who most certainly is not a young muslim man). The author, who is the founder of Court TV, has chosen instead to cheerlead this presidential administration on faith, rather than on fact.
Rating:
Summary: Written to stay on the cocktail party circuit
Review: With all due respect to Mr. Brill's past success as an entrepreneur, this is a very dangerous book. The conclusion he draws that our government has saved the Republic from the whims of terorrists is not only misguided, it is simply wrong. As many know, it was our government that opened the door for the 9/11 terorrists to do what they did. Officials in the FAA, INS, Customs, and intelligence agencies could have acted at any moment along the way to prevent 9/11. They chose not to and 3,000 innocent souls were lost. By failing to demand any accountability from our nation's leaders for their complicitous role in enabling the 9/11 hijackers, Mr. Brill has become a schill for the establishment. It appears he is more interested in staying on the cocktail party circuit in NY and DC than telling the real truth. 9/11 was not a failure of the system, but the result of a system set-up to fail. Without accountability, nothing will really ever change. Too bad Mr. Brill missed this point...
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