Gary Ludwig

I received a copy to facilitate my review. The opinions expressed here are my own.

This is a must read for anyone who is thinking about going into the service of an EMT/Paramedic or firefighter. As I read this book I was reminded of one of my best friends and former co-workers at school. Before becoming a tech person in our school district, he had retired from the Chicago Fire Department. My husband had been a firefighter way before we married. When these two would get together they would start talking about "the good old days of fire fighting". I noticed a major difference in their stories. When it was just me with them I got a watered down version of the incident. When the two of them got together and I sat and listened they talked about things like waiting for the police to show up before they were allowed in because the site had to be secured. They would talk in gruesome detail about the things they had seen and the smelled. These were things they could never forget that changed them in some way. If you talk to most fire fighters you get the basic details from them and nothing more.

Reading this book was like sitting down with my husband and Ron. Chief Ludwig laid everything out bare. You heard the good, the bad, and the ugly. You heard of the triumphs and the rewards of a profession that most people didn't think about until after 9/11. I have never ever wanted to be a fire fighter. I have a terrible fear of fire that goes back to several incidents on our farm. One was growing up and trying to put out a grass fire that occurred when wind blew trash out and caught a field on fire. I remember using wet gunny sacks to beat back the flames until the fire department finally got out to our farm. I remember the pain of trying to peel off nylon socks that had gotten so hot they had started to melt to my legs. The second incident occurred while we were at church. My uncle actually interrupted the Wednesday service to tell us our farm was on fire. An arsonist had set the barn on fire that caught several other buildings on fire. I remember sitting on the roof of the house all night watching, afraid the fire would spread. I remember the kind words of the firemen telling us it would be okay and that they would come back the next day to check for hotspots.

As Chief Ludwig demonstrated in his book, firefighting goes way beyond putting out a fire or rescuing someone. It takes your complete mind, body and soul and leaves its on scars and imprints upon it. If can be a very heart wrenching job and at the same time a very fulfilling job. Read this book so that you can have a greater appreciation for those men and women who put their lives on the line daily. I definitely recommend this book.… (plus d'informations)