{"product_id":"without-warning-9781496231451","title":"Without Warning","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e2023 Martin Kansas History Book Award\u003cbr\u003e 2024 Society of Midland Authors AwardHonoree for History\u003cbr\u003e 2024 Kansas Notable Book\u003cbr\u003e Longlist for Reading the West Book Award\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e In 1955 the small town of Udall, Kansas, was home to oil field workers, homemakers, and teenagers looking ahead to their futures. But on the night of May 25, an F5 tornado struck their town without warning. In three minutes the tornado destroyed most of the buildings, including the new high school. It toppled the water tower. It lifted a pickup truck, stripped off its cab, and hung the frame in a tree. By the time the tornado moved on, it had killed 82 people and injured 270 others, more than half the town’s population of roughly 600 people. It remains the deadliest tornado in the history of Kansas.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Jim Minick’s nonfiction account, \u003ci\u003eWithout Warning\u003c\/i\u003e, tells the human story of this disaster, moment by moment, from the perspectives of those who survived. His spellbinding n\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"\u003ci\u003eWithout Warning\u003c\/i\u003e can serve as primary source material for further study of the tornado and could be of interest to collections on Kansas history and natural disaster narratives.\"—C. A. Sproles, \u003ci\u003eChoice\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"For anyone of us who has lost faith in America and its basic sense of seeking the common good, \u003ci\u003eWithout Warning\u003c\/i\u003e is a reminder that regardless of our political leanings, we pull together during times of great crisis and need. Udall, Kansas stands as a shining example.\"—John Newlin, \u003ci\u003eNew York Journal of Books\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"More than a fascinating and emotional read . . . [\u003ci\u003eWithout Warning] \u003c\/i\u003eoffers a guide for enduring disasters yet to come.\"—Michael Ray Taylor, chapter16.org\u003cbr\u003e“A time capsule of rural American lives and a testament to the tenacity and grit of the human spirit, \u003ci\u003eWithout Warning\u003c\/i\u003e captures a community before, during, and after one of the most devastating natural disasters in our nation’s history. This is a story of loss and despair, resilience and hope, all rendered stunningly by prose deeply measured and tightly wrought. Minick is a master of the form.”—David Joy, author of \u003ci\u003eWhen These Mountains Burn\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eWithout Warning\u003c\/i\u003e is a page-turning disaster narrative in the tradition of \u003ci\u003eThe Perfect Storm\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eIsaac’s Storm\u003c\/i\u003e: spare, vivid, suspenseful, meticulously researched, and utterly harrowing. But the havoc an F5 tornado wrecked on this quintessential Kansas small town in the spring of 1955 is only part of the story here. By taking the arc all the way from the calm before the storm to the months-long labor of rebuilding and reanimating, Jim Minick has brought an entire community lovingly to life. At heart, this is a book about how what’s best about our country confronts and overcomes the worst of our weather.”—David Laskin, author of \u003ci\u003eThe Children’s Blizzard\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eWithout Warning\u003c\/i\u003e is a vivid testimony to why modern-day weather forecasting deeply matters, especially to those so often in the path of these dangerous storms. But it is also a story of resiliency—a portrait of people and a town that lost almost everything but somehow found the strength to go on. It’s only through the stories of survivors that we can try to comprehend the precarious nature of tornadoes and prepare as much as one can for a phenomenon that is still so violently unpredictable.”—Holly Bailey, author of \u003ci\u003eThe Mercy of the Sky\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Jim Minick turns anecdote into story, and story into the personal history of an American town, a town that represents a blueprint for responding to other natural crises. The images are often haunting—the ding-ding, ding-ding of a railway crossing bell, lost photos found in a pasture ten miles away, a “mountainous grave” of debris. Twelve years of interviews and research accompany this work, allowing the author the time it takes to become familiar with people—in some sense, a neighbor. Minick wants us to witness the resilience, generosity, kindness, and capacity for change that the storm broke loose that day, amid all its terrible destruction. His hopeful voice is one worth listening to—from the book’s beginning to the wonderful epilogue that concludes it.” —Joyce Dyer, author of \u003ci\u003ePursuing John Brown: On the Trail of a Radical Abolitionist\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“This is vivid, compelling narrative history with the detail, tension, and pacing of fiction, meaning it’s hard to put down. Though I’ve never been to Udall, Kansas, I feel as if I visited in 1955 and met the residents. Their stories are ones we’re all going to need more than ever. If catastrophe strikes us like it did Udall, the big question is going to be, how well will we survive as a community?”—David L. Bristow, author of \u003ci\u003eNebraska History Moments\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTable of Contents\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e List of Illustrations \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Author’s Note \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 1. What Used to Be \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 2. The Weight of It \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 3. What the Lightning Revealed \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 4. Hit by Emptiness \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 5. Something Shifted Inside \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 6. Bigness of Heart \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 7. People Will Return \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 8. Overwhelmed \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 9. So Many Dead \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 10. Distributing Kindness \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 11. The Long Process of Working Through \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 12. Something to Hold Onto \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 13. The Smoke of What Used to Be \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 14. Trying to Find Normal \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 15. Marching On \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 16. Everybody Deserves a Picture \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 17. Remembering \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 18. The People Moving Forward \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Epilogue \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Acknowledgments \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Appendix \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Bibliographic Essay \u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"University of Nebraska Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49409240858967,"sku":"9781496231451","price":17.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9781496231451.jpg?v=1730506103","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/without-warning-9781496231451","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}