Reviews

Perfect Strangers: Friendship, Strength, and Recovery After Boston's Worst Day by Roseann Sdoia

liralen's review against another edition

4.0

If not for Shores Salter holding the tourniquet, Officer Shana Cottone making sure I didn't die right there on the pavement, and firefighter Mike Materia assuring that I survived the trip to Mass General, I would have been among whose [sic] who didn't make it off the pavement alive. (89)

Sdoia was a spectator at the 2013 Boston Marathon, and she lost a leg in the bombings. But Perfect Strangers is about a lot more of that—Sdoia chooses to focus primarily on the people who helped her survive and the bonds they developed afterwards.

I've read a number of books about the marathon bombings, and it's been interesting to see how each writer distinguishes both experience and book, makes it do something that the others don't. (If this sounds cold and clinical, well...oh well. If it helps you think I'm not cold and clinical, I'll note that videos of runners helping other runners are about the only thing that can make me cry on command, and books like this at least come close. Go figure.) Perfect Strangers benefits from three things, I think. First, a really good ghostwriter—not that there's any way for me to know how much of it comes down to the ghostwriter and how much comes down to Sdoia, but this is a partnership that worked out well. Good blend of scene and research, reconstructing not just Sdoia's experience but the experiences of many people involved. Second, distance—putting this out several years after the fact gives Sdoia the space to...have a better idea of where things are going, I guess. More perspective. And finally, humour. Not that she has the slightest obligation to tackle a tough topic/experience with humour, but it's...it's probably a cliché to say it's very Boston, isn't it? But there you go.

When she saw me, Alissa [a friend] thought I was dead, lying in a pool of my own blood, and she began screaming.

Really? I wanted to say to her. Really? I've lost my damn leg, and you're hysterical?

[...]

Finally Shana told her, "You really have to shut the fuck up."

God, I love Boston cops. (41)

Humour aside, there are some really thoughtful moments in here, none more so than when Sdoia pays tribute to the people who ran to help:

Before the smoke cleared, video of the blasts shows an incredible scene: two distinct waves of people moving in different directions—the majority away from the obvious locations of the explosions and lesser numbers, many of them wearing the neon-yellow vests of police, firefighters, and medical personnel, running directly into the smoke and fire. (17)

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"Am I going to die?" I asked Mike, squeezing his hand.

He was silent for a moment before he answered, "No, you're fine. It's only a flesh wound."

It would take me weeks to appreciate the irony, and tenderness, in that comment. (74)

-

"So, I saw that People reporter and you talking at the shoot. What did she ask you?"

He hesitated, his fork pausing over his plate, before answering with his typical no big deal shrug.

"She wanted to know about us, if we were together, I guess."

"And what did you tell her?" I asked, trying to keep my voice even. I was so nervous that the clam I was shucking nearly got shucked onto the floor.

After one of his long silences, he said with another shrug, "I told her I was your fireman." (182)

Nicely done all round.