Rating: 
Summary: The "Other" Great Fire of 1871
Review: The massive Tornado-whipped fire that engulfed the town of Preshtigo, Wisconsin, on October 8, 1871, was one of the deadliest natural disasters in American history, consuming perhaps as many as 2500 lives. And yet it is little remembered today because it occurred at the exact same time as another inferno was consuming the city of Chicago. While the Chicago fire may have wrought more impressive physical destruction, by comparison it was only one-tenth as deadly.Authors Denise Gess and Willaim Lutz now recreate the history of the Preshtigo Fire for modern readers. They set the backdrop by telling a bit about the town before the fire and the people who inhabit it. Then they give accounts of the blaze through the eyes of those few who managed to survive. The descriptions of the blaze and particularly of its aftermath are unrelentingly gruesome and haunting. Gess and Lutz are fine writers. The book is well researched and highly readable. My only quibble is that at just over 220 pages of text it is a tad slight for a work of history. Overall, "Firestorm at Preshtigo" is a haunting true life tale that should be of much appeal to history and disaster buffs.
Rating: 
Summary: The Fire Every American Should Know About
Review: The moment I picked this book up I couldn't put it down again. I felt the same way about THE HOT ZONE and INTO THIN AIR. It's a gripping account of an event every American should know about. In human terms the Peshtigo fire was the most destructive in our history, very like the Civil War was our most destructive war. Gess and Lutz tell this story in a way to make the reader feel like he or she is present as each moment unfolds. My senses were tuned to the taste and smell of the air and as events began to build I too began to wonder where I could find shelter. This was one of America's greatest tragedies but it would be a bigger tragedy if the victims and their story remain obscure. These people deserve the same attention from us as the victims of 9-11. And one more thought. There are monsterous fires in the news every day. They remind us that nature can overpower our most heroic efforts. This account of Pestigo can to a degree
teach us things we need to prevent it from happening again.
Rating:
Summary: This story needed to be told
Review: This book had much of the same effect on me as Norman Maclean's Young Men and Fire. This is a beautiful tribute to the more than 2,500 people who lost their lives in Peshtigo and the surrounding countryside. I always think one of the worst/best things about a good book is that you want more. And I wanted more. I wanted to know all of the people who died and know all the things we don't know. The townspeople who are depicted come alive on the page. The events are related so well, so beautifully, that of course it seems deceptively simple. What happened in October, 1871 is a story so big, so terrible, it needed a wider audience. The people who died,those who were horribly injured, the countless lives that were changed forever deserve to have their story told. And here, it is told honestly,thoughtfully and with attention to research. Peshtigo is also a parable for our times. It is possible lives could have been saved if our actions had been different, if we had not ignored some of the science available at the time.
Rating:
Summary: I COULD NOT STOP READING
Review: This book has the elements of good horror--suspenseful narrative, innocent victims, and a relentlessly evil villain. The difference is that this page-turner actually happened. The story is a piece of our history, the victims were real people, and the villain is a substance we regard daily. Read Firestorm at Peshtigo and your reaction to flame will be forever altered.
Rating: 
Summary: Firestorm at Peshtigo-A social history
Review: This book is an good social history of the Peshtigo area in 1871. Given the source material that is available from that time period is an adequate narrative. It does not really talk about the fire behavior that may have occurred. I'm not sure if the authors intended to discuss fire behavior but they kept referring to "gustnados" as the explanation. Their bibliography and references include a few older references on fire behavior. If you are reading this book because of the wildland fire angle, you will be disappointed.
Rating:
Summary: Firestorm at Peshtigo
Review: What a wonderful book. I could not put it down. It's all about the deadliest fire of all times, at that time. With all the fires raging in the Us today, it opens the doors to how this can happen in such a short time span. Denise also adds the charm of her writing, humor and grace. Her other novels, Good Deeds and Red Whiskey Blues were terrific also. Peshtigo should be on the best seller list in no time.
Rating:
Summary: Hell on Earth
Review: While overshadowed by the great Chicago fire which took place on the same day, October 8, 1871, the firestorm that obliterated Peshtigo, Wisconsin was a tragedy of unprecedented proportion - one of those events evoking the reaction "why didn't I know about this"? Aside from the horror of the fire, which literally cannot be described in words (how can one adequately describe the impact of a 1,000 foot-high wall of fire moving at speeds exceeding 100 miles-per-hour), "Firestorm at Peshtigo" offers fascinating insight to life in the north-central timber forests of the mid-nineteenth century, as well as the infant science of meteorology and the physics of a true firestorm. Notwithstanding, the books primary appeal lies in the almost ghoulish detail in which the incomprehensible devastation of the firestorm is drawn. While the final loss of life will never be known, 2,200 deaths is an accepted estimate in a fire that raged over 2,400 square miles - a conflagration so intense that even the soil burned. Given the primitive state of medicine of the day, the limited communications and access to the relatively remote Green Bay area, and the total destruction of the land and infrastructure, one wonders if the survivors of the fire, scarred both physically and mentally by the fire and loss of family and community, weren't the true victims.
In short, a brutally fascinating nugget of American history, proving again that fact is indeed stranger, and in this case, more lurid, than fiction.
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