A journalist pulls a random day in history from a hat to see if he can make a worthwhile news story from what happened. The result is One Day, a deeply illuminating and affecting exploration of the quiet dramas and human interaction that make a seemingly insignificant day - December 28th, 1986 - into an important, poignant part of American history.
Title: One Day: The Extraordinary Story of an Ordinary 24 Hours in America
Author: Weingarten, Gene
ISBN: 9780399185830
Binding:
Publisher: Penguin Putnam Inc
Publication Date: 2020-09-10
Number of Pages: 384
Weight: 0.2991 kg
One of the 50 Best Nonfiction Books of the Last 25 Years
Slate
A Best Book of the Year
The Washington Post
Slate
Parade
New York Post
The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel
The book adds up to something greater than the individual stories.... Weingarten taps into the wonder of what it is to be alive. -Mike Hill, for the Associated Press
An absorbing snapshot of America. -The New Yorker
More praise for One Day
As I've gotten older, I've become less interested in elaborate fictions or spectacular histories and just want to know how life is lived. I want a book about how other humans get things and lose things, and deal with both, how they cope and how they fail and how they live and how they die. This is the book I've been waiting for. The people described in this book are wonderful and flawed, some of them evil, some of them impossibly good. But none of them have lived the kind of lives that normally get told in books, and in finally seeking them out and telling their stories, Gene has done them, and us, a priceless service. -Peter Sagal, host of NPR's Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! and author of The Incomplete Book of Running
Extraordinary tales from an ordinary day, masterfully fashioned. Because Weingarten is such a compelling storyteller, it's easy to overlook how much A+ journalism undergirds One Day. Every detail, every quote, is not just the answer to a question; it's the answer to precisely the right question. -Garry Trudeau, creator of Doonesbury
I loved this book. I ripped through it in an evening. I couldn't put it down. -Petra Mayer on NPR's Here & Now
An excellent book...humble yet profound. -Guardian
[Weingarten has] uncommon storytelling gifts.... The two-time Pulitzer winner and Washington Post columnist takes a single day in history and weaves together multiple stories of tragedy, revelation and wonder. One Day is full of scenes and wordsmithing that can make a reader elbow her partner in the ribs and force him to listen to a read-aloud. That's the hallmark of memorable feature writing. More, please. -Washington Post
One of the Best Books of 2019. -Washington Post
A captivating portrait of a day in the life of the United States by a much-honored Washington Post journalist... One of the finest plain-prose stylists in American journalism, Weingarten tells his elegantly structured stories without sentimentality or melodrama... A slice of American life carved out by a master of the form. -Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
Everybody loves a good story, especially when it's told by a master storyteller. This collection should have wide appeal, whether read straight through, cover to cover, or dipped into for an occasional article. -Booklist (starred review)
[One Day] is a stunt, a dare, but it's also proof of the belief that animates all the books on this list: There are stories everywhere. The nonfiction writer's job is to look long and hard enough to find them, and to tell them with enough empathy and care to bring them to life. -Slate
By paying close attention, Mr. Weingarten opens our eyes to the potent meanings of everyday stories all around us.... As the minutes tick by toward midnight, Gene Weingarten's powerful retellings elevate the ordinary to the extraordinary and yield to an awakened sense of awe. -Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
One Day...includes a serial killer, a famous band, a helicopter crash, and a tragic fire. But it also includes more prosaic stories that testify to the premise of the book: Stories are everywhere, and every one is interesting; all it takes is a reporter dogged enough to find people's stories, and tell them. -Slate
A trove of compelling human-interest pieces with long reverberations. -Publishers Weekly
Much more than a gimmick...full of riveting tales. -Washingtonian
A brilliant concept deftly researched and presented...an inherently fascinating read. Thoughtful and thought-provoking. -Midwest Book Review
A master storyteller...a helluva good look at The Human Experience...a collection of ripping yarns. -The Star Tribune
Ace writer mines tales from a random Sunday...to organize a book bristling with drama. The journalistic version of a swan dive off a tall ladder into a teacup. -Chicago Sun-Times
This snapshot of the nation on one particular day is one that deserves pride of place in America's family album. -Daily Beast
One of Fall 2019's Biggest Books...Weingarten, who has won two Pulitzers for feature writing, tells it as few can. -The Philadelphia Inquirer
A fascinating conceit. -USA Today
Dramatic narrative nonfiction...offer[ing] a new perspective on world history. -USA Today
Fall books for your must-read list...It is a great book. It's not about anything huge, it's not uncovering murder mysteries or anything, but it makes connections about people's lives in America at that time that reverberates today. -Minnesota Public Radio
What makes One Day so extraordinary is how Weingarten combines dogged, detailed reporting with beautiful, flowing prose. You seldom see those two attributes combined in one writer. -The Antelope Valley Press
