While the real-life event around which this short narrative was shaped should definitely get more attention, I found the writing style to be plodding, pedestrian, and surprisingly off-kilter. McLain drops some odd references and has her main character, the actual janitor Fritz Hirter from the actual tragedy, laid out in a startlingly emotionally distant play-by-play of what may have happened that day.

First I was a little put off by a sudden sexual reference when his thoughts turning to his wife that morning — which in and of itself was fine, but the nipple being called out from his memory as (and I'm paraphrasing) hard like a currant was too much knowing the content of what was to come.

Then as the story progresses, and McLain is taking the reader and Fritz through various moments that ultimately leads to 175 deaths, Fritz's reactions felt completely out of balance with the horrors he was witnessing.

Lastly, present tense killed this for me.

I think the style and other choices in the writing bordered on being such a disservice to the Lake View School fire that it makes me question whether or not I should pick up a McLain book in the future, something I've yet to do.

Audiobook, as narrated by [a:Malcolm Hillgartner|1165191|Malcolm Hillgartner|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png]: Hillgartner did not help the issues I had — his voice sounded old school audiobook narration and matched the old school feel of this historical fiction offering.