Quando ho iniziato a leggere questo libro, non mi aspettavo certo delle storie spensierate: il tema – il racconto della morte dei dieci ragazzi uccisi a colpi di arma da fuoco il 23 novembre 2013 negli USA – è ben evidente e non può essere frainteso. Eppure, quando ho letto di Jaiden Dixon, la prima vittima raccontata da Younge, sono rimasta scioccata lo stesso.

Con l’autore di questo libro condivido la cultura europea e la difficoltà di capire la cultura delle armi statunitense e il loro attaccamento al secondo emendamento. Ho letto vari articoli sull’argomento e continua a sembrarmi assurda la logica secondo la quale l’unico modo per impedire a una persona armata di uccidere sia una maggiore diffusione delle armi in modo tale che quella persona sia fermata da un’altra persona armata. L’ipotesi che nessuna di quelle persone abbia un’arma sembra non sfiorarlз nemmeno.

Forse è l’impossibilità di capire questo aspetto della cultura statunitense che ha portato Younge a scrivere un libro non sul controllo delle armi, ma sulla società che permette una diffusione così noncurante delle armi. Attraverso le storie delle dieci giovani vittime del 23 novembre 2013, l’autore ci parla delle conseguenze dell’onnipresenza delle armi – i danni collaterali che ogni decisione porta con sé – e dell’accettazione del numero delle vittime come di un fatto inevitabile e incontrovertibile, appena scossa soltanto dal trauma delle sparatorie di massa.

Se comprendere questo aspetto della cultura statunitense mi è impossibile, ho preso la lettura di Un altro giorno di morte in America come un monito a non cedere al fascino della legittima difesa facile e dell’aumento di persone armate a difesa della nostra sicurezza. Probabilmente nessun’altra democrazia al mondo conta più armi e forze dell’ordine in circolazione, eppure lз cittadinз non sono affatto più sicurз. Anzi, l’insicurezza è a portata di mano: bastano delle armi incustodite e la naturale curiosità di un bambino a cancellare una giovane vita.

Insomma, un giorno come un altro negli Stati Uniti e, come di consueto in un normalissimo sabato americano, dieci bambini e adolescenti venivano uccisi da un’arma da fuoco. Come il clima di quel giorno, nessuno di loro sarebbe finito sulle prime pagine dei quotidiani nazionali perché, proprio come il clima, la loro morte non turbava l’ordine stabilito, ma anzi vi si conformava. Rispetto a quanto ci si poteva aspettare da un sabato americano qualsiasi, infatti, nemmeno in questa cifra c’era l’ombra dell’inganno perché era esattamente quella cui la nazione era abituata. Ogni giorno, in media, negli Stati Uniti sette bambini e adolescenti perdono la vita a causa di un colpo d’arma da fuoco – per essere precisi nel 2013 erano 6,75. Le armi da fuoco sono la principale causa di mortalità tra i neri sotto i diciannove anni e la seconda per la stessa fascia d’età in generale, preceduta solo dagli incidenti stradali.

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I am finding it hard to gather adequate words to discuss, review, or frame this book. It was painful to read and on several occasions I had to dog ear my page and set it aside until I could compose myself and muster the mental armor to continue forth. It took me seven days to read this book which means from the moment I cracked open the spine until the moment I flipped the last page approximately 70 more children in this country were shot dead. That is not okay. Younge's work should become a part of the national conversation, as he tackled the subject with such dignity and tact while remaining frank and factual. To sum up, I will borrow some of the author's words because I am still finding it difficult to rally my own:

"[M]ore than its making me want to scream at anyone in particular, it has mostly made me want to just howl at the moon. A long, doleful, piercing cry for a wealthy country that could and should do better for its youth and children-- for my children-- but that appears to have settled, legislatively at least, on a pain threshold that is morally unacceptable." ( )

(57) This was a powerful exploration of the enormity and tragedy of gun violence in America focused though the lens of all the children killed by guns in on a certain random day in this country. Each short life extinguished by guns on November 23, 2013 is examined through police reports and interviews with friends and family, social media accounts. This British reporter living in the US with his family took a bit of an outsider's view at what goes on in our country and pretty much nailed it spot on. Black lives actually don't matter is the message in this book. It almost seems like they don't even matter to the people living them.

I think the author did a nice job presenting his argument against easy access to guns in this country. He did it however, in a realistic way. Guns aren't going away in this country it seems - so let's just point out the cost of that 'freedom,' shall we? He also presents an empathic picture of the impoverished communities where these gun deaths take place, without being an apologist for criminal behavior. It helps that he is non-white and an American - he can point out that it is black on black crime that is more of an issue than black youths being shot by police more effectively than a white American.

Some of the details of each child's life were tough to read - Younge nicely points out that there is a lot between an 'innocent babe' gunned down like at Sandy Hook and evil predators that had it coming to them. But the social media excerpts were still awful - I'll leave it at that. I refuse to accept that it is fine for the black community to refer to each other as 'nigga,' and then get your knickers in a twist if others do the same. Anyway, something about the the inclusion of so much petty and awful details ultimately accounted for the 1 star off - but I guess, reality is reality and he had to be true to his premise.

There is an undercurrent of fatalism in this book that is chilling - like he knows his audience are likely people like me. This sentence in the afterword hit home - "The more likely you are to be wealthy or white, the less likely you are to believe that these children could be your children. Statistically that is true, but the fact remains that they are somebody's children, and those parents grieve just like everyone else."

Depressing. This is so shameful. Really well-done, albeit leaves one feeling rather hopeless. ( )

This is such a good concept for a book, but the execution was off for me. Each of the ten deaths that occurred that day could easily have had an entire book written about it, so it felt like none of them got the attention to detail that they deserved. Younge succeeded in showing the breadth of gun deaths on any given day, but only glanced on the cultural and governmental factors involved. ( )

I’m not even sure what to say about this book...wow! This is a thought-provoking book. The author chose a random day, then traced all the deaths of children who died that day as a result of a gun. As the author says in his introduction, this “is not a book about gun control; it is a book made possible by the lack of gun control.”

Though the subject was not easy to read about, it was hard for me to put this book down. One thing that made it interesting was that the perspective of the author was as a black man from England coming from gun-free culture to the gun culture of the U.S. You can feel his initial bewilderment at the ready availability of guns.

I also thought he made an interesting observation about our tendency to feel a shooting death is more tragic when a child is a well-behaved, good student who is always where he should be, thus implying that perhaps a student of lesser abilities who occasionally misbehaves and hangs out in the wrong place somehow ‘deserves’ his fate. As I mentioned, the book is thought-provoking.

This is a well-researched book. For each of the ten boys who died that day, the author not only relates the circumstances of the death, but attempts to go beyond the death, interviewing friends and family to flesh out his story. I really felt like I got to know most of these kids, and some of the stories have stayed with me, even almost a month after I’ve finished the book. The author hasn’t really offered me any solutions, but he did give me a lot to think about! ( )