Recounting her childhood wounds of growing up with an abusive, alcoholic father, and her later brushes with near-death experiences, like a pulmonary embolism that caused a heart attack or her surgery for a ruptured duodenal ulcer, Hodges recounts, with candor and self-knowledge, how she moved from living and making decisions based upon fear to using her traumatic life events "to be better prepared for whatever may come.” Through patients, co-workers, family, and friends, Hodges explores "how the ripples of trauma" spread but also her conviction that there is always still beauty to be found in the world. That holds true even as her stories as a first responder touch on harrowing events, from search and rescues at plane crash sites to burning men running through traffic, and more "terrible days in people’s lives.”

With humor, hope, and raw honesty, Hodges explores those days, including stories of patients who recover and those who don’t, and her awareness of "that ticking clock" that looms over us all. "My time around death,” she writes, has “allowed me to build up my defenses against the horrors in our world." Readers will take away the resounding message that no matter what one endures, life offers the choice to hold out for hope until the last breath.

Takeaway: First responder’s memoir exploring darkness, trauma, and the hope in second chances

Comparable Titles: Tim Booth's You Called an Ambulance for What, Janice Hudson's Trauma Junkie.

Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: A