This is a nonfiction book about people who have suffered gun violence in Chicago centered around the summer of 2013. I really enjoyed this. It's so heart wrenching. Some of the people are just little kids, who've lost their lives or lost friends or witnessed shootings. I almost wanted to forget while reading it that these were real people because it was so hard.

Each chapter is essentially a portrait of a different act of violence focused on the people involved. Some chapters focus more on the act and some focus more on an individual person who was involved. They read like articles, unrelated except by the general theme of gun violence tying everything together. Each was well written and fully rounded and fascinating.

The only negative I have on this book was that it felt a little lacking to me. This book is only snapshots of the violence. It doesn't offer any outside commentary or analysis, doesn't try to. The most you get is a general "gun violence is bad" kind of gist. Which is fine, I still obviously rated this book four stars, but I did want something a little bit more. I think because it was just these quick portraits, it's not going to stay with me as long as I would like for it to. I think for something like this, I do want a little analysis to go with the descriptions of people's experiences and feelings.

I thought this was great, though, and I would highly recommend. It's really eye opening. It also made me want to read his earlier book There Are No Children Here because he referenced it a number of times. It focuses on two children specifically so I think the more in depth focus might solve some of my problems with this one.