Ike

With a hurricane bearing down on Galveston, I’d be remiss in not recommending to the uninitiated Erik Larson’s 2000 book on the great Galveston hurricane of 1900, which killed more people than any other single natural calamity in U.S. history. Isaac’s Storm is an easy and engrossing read; I raced through it on a transatlantic flight. Worth your time.