One of Us

Mass shootings have always freaked me out. I was in middle school when Columbine happened. I've always had a little voice in the back of my head telling me that it might not be completely safe to be in public virtually anywhere. And now that I'm a parent, I hate even more that the country I live in has taken no effective steps to protect us from that violence, particularly in school. One of the most horrifying recent mass shootings, however, took place in Norway, and this book (translated from Norwegian) takes a deep dive into both how the killer became who he was/is, the lives of a few of the victims, and the awful lapses that failed to prevent more bloodshed on the day it happened, wrapping up with an account of the trial. Obviously this was incredibly difficult to read, often completely heartbreaking, and it took me longer than expected to finish because I could only deal with so much at a time but it's honestly extremely good and very much worth reading if you've ever wondered how something like this could have happened there.