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The arguments regarding the historiographic authenticity of Issac’s Storm brought about in this article against the are valid. The book does seem to take liberties regarding characters and events, and tries to cover this up with complex explanations of how the weather is studied and details of the storm. While it is harsh I agree with the Meteorological Journal Weatherwise when they called “Larson’s narrative ‘reading at its best.’” While I think that the book gives an excellent illustration of what an event like the Galveston hurricane would be like, I don’t however think it should be classified as nonfiction like the author is trying to make it out to be. Even in the book’s notes that we observed in class were based on an event that could be related to the hurricane or, in the case of the orphanage, names of characters that could have survived.
This is not to completely disregard the historical accuracy of the book as I’m sure he thoroughly research this event and wrote a story as close to his findings as possible, but if you are going to pass something off as history then all of the events should be as accurate as possible. I agree with mvanderdussen’s statement “I think that Larson did bend the truth in a few places, but it was to help add readability to the book….” While not being my cup of tea, the book was readable. I do like his writing style and I am currently listening to his book The Devil in the White City. But just like Issac’s Storm I wouldn’t classify it as nonfiction. In my opinion Erik Larson is an interesting author who seems to think that history needs to be spiced up with a narrative to appeal to a wider audience.