In the dark days that followed "The Thing," as Louisianans refer to
Hurricane Katrina, I hungered for news of New Orleans. I fed that need
by reading the daily columns of Chris Rose, a reporter for the Crescent
City's Times-Picayune newspaper. Rose's writings described his city
and its inhabitants in vivid, human detail.
This collection of those columns, 1 Dead in Attic, tells the story of
the storm's aftermath better than most anything I've read. The title
provides a stark reminder of the tragedy of the spray-painted houses:
"There's the one I pass on St. Roch Avenue in the 8th Ward at least
once a week. It says: ' 1 Dead in Attic.' . . . I wonder if I ever met 1
Dead in Attic. Maybe in the course of my job or maybe at a Saints game
or maybe we once stood next to each other at a Mardi Gras parade. . ."
Columns run from funny to bizarre to heartbreaking, and all of it almost
broke the author. Rose writes about the depression that eventually
settled heavily upon his shoulders, the progression of emotional
meltdowns, shutdown, and the help he finally sought and received. It's
a gut-level-honest and well-written account of Katrina's toll on a city
and its citizens. --Wanda McKinney
