Lethal Passage

The Story of a Gun

Author Erik Larson On Tour
Look inside
This devastating book begins with an account of a crime that is by now almost commonplace: on December 16, 1988, sixteen-year-old Nicholas Elliot walked into his Virginia high school with a Cobray M-11/9 and several hundred rounds of ammunition tucked in his backpack. By day’s end, he had killed one teacher and severely wounded another.

In Lethal Passage Erik Larson shows us how a disturbed teenager was able to buy a weapon advertised as “the gun that made the eighties roar.” In so doing, he not only illuminates America’s gun culture—its manufacturers, dealers, buffs, and propagandists—but also offers concrete solutions to our national epidemic of death by firearm. The result is a book that can—and should—save lives, and that has already become an essential text in the gun-control debate.


“Larson takes us past the absurd myths, past the numbing statistics, and into the face of reality. . . . Journalism at its highest.” —Los Angeles Times Book Review
© Nina Subin
Erik Larson is the author of six New York Times bestsellers, including The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz, which examines how Winston Churchill and his “Secret Circle” went about surviving the German air campaign of 1940-41. Larson’s The Devil in the White City is set to be a Hulu limited series; his In the Garden of Beasts is under option by Tom Hanks for a feature film. He recently published an audio-original ghost story, No One Goes Alone, which has been optioned by Chernin Entertainment, in association with Netflix. His Thunderstruck has been optioned by Sony Pictures Television for a limited TV series. Larson lives in Manhattan with his wife, who is a writer and retired neonatologist; they have three grown daughters. View titles by Erik Larson
"Larson takes us past the absurd myths, past the numbing statistics, and into the face of reality.... Journalism at its highest."

-- Los Angeles Times Book Review



"An artful slice of the story of what may be the greatest shame we as a nation have tried... to hide from ourselves.... Fascinating." -- Chicago Sun-Times

About

This devastating book begins with an account of a crime that is by now almost commonplace: on December 16, 1988, sixteen-year-old Nicholas Elliot walked into his Virginia high school with a Cobray M-11/9 and several hundred rounds of ammunition tucked in his backpack. By day’s end, he had killed one teacher and severely wounded another.

In Lethal Passage Erik Larson shows us how a disturbed teenager was able to buy a weapon advertised as “the gun that made the eighties roar.” In so doing, he not only illuminates America’s gun culture—its manufacturers, dealers, buffs, and propagandists—but also offers concrete solutions to our national epidemic of death by firearm. The result is a book that can—and should—save lives, and that has already become an essential text in the gun-control debate.


“Larson takes us past the absurd myths, past the numbing statistics, and into the face of reality. . . . Journalism at its highest.” —Los Angeles Times Book Review

Author

© Nina Subin
Erik Larson is the author of six New York Times bestsellers, including The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz, which examines how Winston Churchill and his “Secret Circle” went about surviving the German air campaign of 1940-41. Larson’s The Devil in the White City is set to be a Hulu limited series; his In the Garden of Beasts is under option by Tom Hanks for a feature film. He recently published an audio-original ghost story, No One Goes Alone, which has been optioned by Chernin Entertainment, in association with Netflix. His Thunderstruck has been optioned by Sony Pictures Television for a limited TV series. Larson lives in Manhattan with his wife, who is a writer and retired neonatologist; they have three grown daughters. View titles by Erik Larson

Praise

"Larson takes us past the absurd myths, past the numbing statistics, and into the face of reality.... Journalism at its highest."

-- Los Angeles Times Book Review



"An artful slice of the story of what may be the greatest shame we as a nation have tried... to hide from ourselves.... Fascinating." -- Chicago Sun-Times

PRH Education High School Collections

All reading communities should contain protected time for the sake of reading. Independent reading practices emphasize the process of making meaning through reading, not an end product. The school culture (teachers, administration, etc.) should affirm this daily practice time as inherently important instructional time for all readers. (NCTE, 2019)   The Penguin Random House High

Read more

PRH Education Translanguaging Collections

Translanguaging is a communicative practice of bilinguals and multilinguals, that is, it is a practice whereby bilinguals and multilinguals use their entire linguistic repertoire to communicate and make meaning (García, 2009; García, Ibarra Johnson, & Seltzer, 2017)   It is through that lens that we have partnered with teacher educators and bilingual education experts, Drs.

Read more

PRH Education Classroom Libraries

“Books are a students’ passport to entering and actively participating in a global society with the empathy, compassion, and knowledge it takes to become the problem solvers the world needs.” –Laura Robb   Research shows that reading and literacy directly impacts students’ academic success and personal growth. To help promote the importance of daily independent

Read more