Sue Klebold's book out in paperback: A Mother's Reckoning

Sue Klebold's A Mother's Reckoning comes out in paperback today, with a new preface by Sue. (Of course it's Sue's memoir of her son Dylan Klebold and his role in Columbine.)

I vividly recall the hardcover book's release last February. I watched her 20/20 Interview with Diane Sawyer intently, and stayed up until 7 a.m. writing my reaction for Vanity Fair: Columbine Author Dave Cullen on Sue Klebold's First TV Interview ... (Then I went to bed, and was awoken at 9 a.m., as agreed, by my editor with his edits to go through and hash out the changes for the next few hours.)

I had a lot of murder stuff going on in my life just then, and as I started reading Sue's book, I was quite taken by it, but I felt another bout of PTSD coming on. Sometimes I brush off those early warnings, always with shitty consequences, so this time, I put it down.

(Maybe it being a book about the horrific consequences of brushing off depression helped!)

I'm really eager to hear the rest of Sue Klebold's story, so I decided to pick it up again today, but now I can't find it. Hmmmmm. I know it's in here somewhere. I REALLY need to re-organize my home library.

(Digression: I loved the way it was organized in Denver, but the one thing I regret about my move to NYC was believing everyone who assured me I'd have no space and needed to unload most of my 500 books. What a terrible loss that was. I saved about 100, and I've built close to 300 back rapidly, but they came so fast, and I kept creating new shelves for them, so they're too haphazard and now I can't find anything. Sigh. A big project for a day I REALLY want to procrastinate! Haha.)

Anyway, I will plunge back in soon, and let you know what I think. I read a bit of it in galleys. I helped Sue fact-check the pages on the actual shootings, and was really impressed by the way she handled that very tricky aspect.

I was incredibly impressed again last week, by the brave TED Talk Sue posted: "My son was a Columbine shooter. This is my story, by Sue Klebold." (A bit on my response to it here.)

BTW, I redid my website over Christmas, and then started on recreating The Columbine Guide in a new format, and I keep adding more material, most recently Dylan Klebold's "Senior Predictions"--that's as heartbreaking as it sounds.