Every generation has a defining moment in history.  A generation ago, the question everyone knew the answer to was, "Where were you when you heard JFK was shot?" or "Where were you when you heard Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated?"  Now, it's, "Where were you when you first heard the news on 9/11?"

Columbine is one such moment in history, so even if this book is recent history, I consider it history nonetheless.  Over twelve years ago, the entire nation watched and waited and wondered what exactly had gone on behind the walls of Columbine high school.  In Columbine, Dave Cullen does what nothing had yet done -- not the parent memoirs, the published diaries of the dead, the articles or interviews or police reports.  Cullen brings not just that terrible morning, but also the weeks and months and years leading up to it, to life.

I've seen a lot of comments online, complaints that Cullen doesn't know what he's talking about, but having read the book I have to say his research is impeccable.  He takes into account everything: police reports, firsthand accounts, and the journals and videos made by the killers.  He expertly weaves all of this together to give us something that nothing else had done before this book: a seamless account of what happened that day.

As someone who grew up in the neighborhood, attended Columbine's sister school, and knew Columbine students at the time, this book was an incredibly compelling read for me.  It was quite an experience to read about my hometown, and the event that both ripped us apart and put us on the national map, from an outsider's eyes.  I also must confess to being one of those who hungrily read all the news about the massacre at the time, so this book satisfied a curiosity that I've harbored since 1999.

The book also answers questions that have troubled our country ever since: What kind of a kid could do this kind of thing?  Why didn't anyone see the signs?  Cullen uses the boys' journals to show what kinds of kids they were (and how different they were), as well as when and how some of the "warning signs" were overlooked.

The amount of research that went into this book must have been phenomenal -- Columbine is truly a masterful retelling of recent history!