America is Under Attack: The Day the Towers Fell

America is Under Attack: The Day the Towers Fell

Written and illustrated by: Don Brown

Grade Level: 4-8

Genre: Nonfiction

How would you feel if in a matter of seconds your whole world came crashing down? That’s how America felt on the horrible morning on September 11, 2001. This is the story about a day in our nation’s history which will never be forgotten.

            America is Under Attack: The Day the Towers Fell is a student friendly story about the September 11^th attacks on our country. The story begins describing the day as the same as any other. People are heading to school and work; everyone is going on with their normal lives. Then, we learn about a terrible group of people called al-Qaeda and their leader, Osama Bin Laden, and how they hijacked four planes that morning using knives, pepper spray and other acts of violence. Once, the first plane hits the North Tower, Fire Chief Joseph Pfiefer is introduced into the story. Just seventeen minutes after the first plane hit, the South tower became the second target. Americans watching the news now knew that this was not an accident, this was a blatant attack on our country and something had to be done. As the story unfolds, readers meet more people; some who survive, and others who were not so lucky. The story ends after the two towers collapse, the Pentagon was hit, the fourth Plane crashed in Pennsylvania, and Americans were left but nothing with hope to find their loved ones. 

            America is Under Attack: The Day the Towers Fell is a nonfiction story of the events that took place on September 11, 2001. From the moment the North Tower was hit until finding bodies months after the attack, this book discusses it all. The book mentions several people, from fire chiefs, to people who worked in the towers. All of them were real people; some liked and some did not; but they were all there. The author of this story used quotes directly from the people involved and cites them on the last page. Along with these citations, the author provides an author’s note with some statistics about that day, a dedication to neighbors whose lives were lost (she was from NY), and a complete bibliography listing all the sources she pulled from to make this story come alive.

            Similar to biographies, many people turn away from nonfiction books because they tend to be boring and be a tedious list of facts; this book is very different. Unlike a typical nonfiction book, this one does not follow the usual format using titles, heading and a table of contents. Instead, it follows the set up of a normal picture book. It uses amazing illustrations to make the text come alive, and uses characters and dialogue to make the story interesting.  I would absolutely highlight this book in my classroom, assuming I am teaching the appropriate grade level. A few years after 9/11, the facts began to be printed in the back of textbooks. Now, over ten years later, it is an event in American History which children need to be aware of. Not only do they need to understand the factual events, but they need to feel the emotions that we felt watching this live on TV. They need to understand how much love and hope went into the rescue missions for years after; they need to realized that some people still are yet to be found. In general, literature is my favorite way of introducing a lesson in a different content area such as science or social studies. To be able to introduce a lesson using nonfiction text such as this, would, in my opinion, make the students even more interested in the topic ahead.

            This book meets standard MA.3 stating that students should be able to explain the relationships or interactions between two or more individuals, events, ideas, or concepts in a historical, scientific, or technical text based on specific information in the text. This is because the book highlights many interactions between people and also explains the relationship of Bin Laden and al-Qaeda to America. It also meets standard Ma.6 which states that students should be able to analyze multiple accounts of the same event or topic, noting important similarities and

differences in the point of view they represent. It would meet this standard in a classroom because there are so many accounts from this event as well as article and books written about it, that students would very easily be able to compare them.