In April, 2000, author Peter Leschak discovered the diary of Father Pernin, one of the survivors of the Peshtigo disaster in 1871. Throughout that summer, when Leschak was fighting fires, himself, he takes us through Pernin's experiences with the Great Peshtigo Fire, along with his own reflections on his journey from the ministry to fireground leader.
I had originally picked up this book because I was looking for something on the Peshtigo Fire, which I'm quite familiar with. I found this to be an interesting read, and not quite what I had expected. Leschak's own background and experiences with fighting wildland fires is really interesting, and to have the additional reflections that he has upon reading Pernin's diary gives the book an extra layer of information. Understanding the realities of fighting wildland fires, Leschak's insights into what happened in Peshtigo lends to that history, as well.
I did find that this book sometimes had some slow parts, and feel that better pacing (or editing) would help with this. I also don't know if I would have found it as interesting if I didn't know anything about the Peshtigo fire, so my advice to another reader would be: if wildland firefighting is something you find interesting, you might like this book. If you know about the Peshtigo fire and are interested in current-day practices for fighting wildland fires, you might like this book. However, I think that those are two types of readers who would like this book; to someone just picking it up out of curiosity, the book might be too dry.
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