Rating: 
Summary: A Sweet Book
Review: Read this book! It will make you feel happy to be a member of the human race. All the reviews are spot-on (including the ones that complain about the lack of maps). I was lucky enough to teach school with several Newfoundlanders in the seventies, and they are indeed a marvelous breed.Recognize that this story is more about them, and their wonderful generosity, than it is about the major events of 9/11. You may fell a little like the passengers themselves the first twenty-four to thirty-six hours: removed from precise knowledge of what was going on in New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania. But that's all right, because what was going on in Gander was so so special. There had to be a million ways to tell this story, yet DeFede expertly concentrates on a couple of dozen (of the 6,000) passengers, on several Newfies, and on a couple of crew members, and keeps everything straight for us as he weaves their stories together. There are a lot of laughs, and a lot of tears. (These come mostly at the outset, when you do recall the attacks, and at the end, with some of the poignant finales to people's journeys. There is a gripping connection to the Holocaust as the week winds down.) You are actually drawn into others' bonding experience, no mean feat! My two sons were both working in New York on 9/11/01, one of them just four blocks south of the 2WTC (and the other, we later learned, might easily have been at a nine o'clock meeting in that building). I knew five guys who worked in those buildings who died that day, plus two others whose sons died. I read American Ground and loved it, but I tread gingerly on this stuff, since I'm not really over the whole thing yet. Having said that, I was a little disappointed that this book wasn't more connected to the world events of the time. It becomes something of a romp.
Rating:
Summary: A Sweet Book
Review: Read this book! It will make you feel happy to be a member of the human race. All the reviews are spot-on (including the ones that complain about the lack of maps). I was lucky enough to teach school with several Newfoundlanders in the seventies, and they are indeed a marvelous breed. Recognize that this story is more about them, and their wonderful generosity, than it is about the major events of 9/11. You may fell a little like the passengers themselves the first twenty-four to thirty-six hours: removed from precise knowledge of what was going on in New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania. But that's all right, because what was going on in Gander was so so special. There had to be a million ways to tell this story, yet DeFede expertly concentrates on a couple of dozen (of the 6,000) passengers, on several Newfies, and on a couple of crew members, and keeps everything straight for us as he weaves their stories together. There are a lot of laughs, and a lot of tears. (These come mostly at the outset, when you do recall the attacks, and at the end, with some of the poignant finales to people's journeys. There is a gripping connection to the Holocaust as the week winds down.) You are actually drawn into others' bonding experience, no mean feat! My two sons were both working in New York on 9/11/01, one of them just four blocks south of the 2WTC (and the other, we later learned, might easily have been at a nine o'clock meeting in that building). I knew five guys who worked in those buildings who died that day, plus two others whose sons died. I read American Ground and loved it, but I tread gingerly on this stuff, since I'm not really over the whole thing yet. Having said that, I was a little disappointed that this book wasn't more connected to the world events of the time. It becomes something of a romp. The kookiest thing of all is that DeFede quotes President Bush's speech from a week later as taking place the night of 9/11! Everybody knows that's not true, and (although it's far from a major blemish on this book) putting it there creates as sense of confidence and coherence that frankly didn't exist in people's hearts and minds that awful day, that awful week.
Rating: 
Summary: A love Story for all Nations
Review: Teachers take note! This is a must read for all future leaders. Jim DeFede tells the reality of people coming together to be "in the moment" during a very difficult moment.
Clergy, this is a must read for religious studies!This is a how to book for adults -- how to turn evil into good, how to step across politics, religion, take down the borders that separate us and take charge, how to work for peace.
Parents, a family read! Young and old, children, women, men and animals, every one is counted and made to be accountable for making life go on!
A fine gift book --Heart warming sincerity at its best!
Rating:
Summary: A love Story for all Nations
Review: Teachers take note! This is a must read for all future leaders. Jim DeFede tells the reality of people coming together to be "in the moment" during a very difficult moment.
Clergy, this is a must read for religious studies!This is a how to book for adults -- how to turn evil into good, how to step across politics, religion, take down the borders that separate us and take charge, how to work for peace.
Parents, a family read! Young and old, children, women, men and animals, every one is counted and made to be accountable for making life go on!
A fine gift book --Heart warming sincerity at its best!
Rating:
Summary: an immense story
Review: THE DAY THE WORLD CAME TO TOWN is a little book with a huge story to tell about that September day in 2001, when 38 jetliners, carrying over 6500 souls (plus a small zoo of animals in their holds!) came home to roost on an island with its own time zone in a land of Good Samaritans, because the world as we knew it had changed forever. RebeccasReads recommend THE DAY THE WORLD CAME TO TOWN as one of those immense stories from our collective 9/11 experience of how our neighbors to the north took us in & cared for us. It is also the modern global inter-connectedness that glows from Jim DeFede's gathering of the strands of people's lives into a braid of fear, compassion & gratitude.
Rating:
Summary: A different story about 9/11
Review: This book uncovers a more or less unknown story of the events of 9/11.
For me personally this story is very true. I was one of the passengers that had to divert to Gander, and as soon as the book arrived, I've read the book within one day. I just could not stop. Never before was I so emotionally touched by a book. Maybe because this book is about "us", who landed in Gander. I don't know. I have learned things from the book, which most of the passengers did not know before. It is just amazing how everything got organized by the citizens of Gander and surrounding communities with the support of the Salvation Army.
Jim DeFede picks a few passengers who were aboard different airliners and re-tells their story. I do have my own story (as probably every passenger who was stranded in Gander), and it is interesting to see how other people lived through the week after 9/11 in Newfoundland. If you want to know about a different story of 9/11, read this book, and you will be amazed how people were helping complete strangers that were caught in the tragic events.
Rating:
Summary: Thank You!
Review: This book was wonderful! It arrived yesterday late in the afternoon and I finished it this morning. The book was very well written and even more important to me and my family it was an uplifting view of the generosity and kindness of the people that came to our country's aide. I want to thank the author for writing this book. There is someone else I need to thank. Sir, I don't know your name my husband, David, was in too much shock at the time to remember if you even gave it but September 11 2001 you took him off the street in New York and gave him water and the opportunity to phone home. Whoever you are I hope you see this and know my family thanks you from the bottom of our hearts.
Rating:
Summary: fabulous heart warming book
Review: this is a book about how all the people in Newfoundland came together when they were deluged with airline passengers on sep 11. its story of joy, sadness, triumph, friendship, family. it will warm your heart. if you get a chance, try to catch the pbs show about this book. simply wonderful.
Rating:
Summary: Proud to be from Gander
Review: This wonderful book only tells a small part of what went on in Gander during the horrible days surrounding Sept.11. My friends opened their homes and put their washing machines into overdrive to accomodate the "plane people". Jim DeFede does a great job telling the story of the events in Gander. This book should help you open your heart to anyone in need of help, companionship, and a hot, home-cooked dinner.
Rating: 
Summary: too much missing
Review: too much missing for intellectual interest and the historical record: 1) no map of newfoundland (unbelievable!)
2) not even one detailed example of the aerial feats accomplished 9/11 by gander's air traffic controllers
3) especially in light of 2), where is timeline of the 38 flights, departure cities, and arrival time at gander?
nevertheless, personal stories are wonderful. amazing that one story relates all the way back to the holocaust (50 years ago!). a good decision: no celebrity stories!
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