This Is Where It Ends by Marieke Nijkamp

From Goodreads,

"10:00 a.m. The principal of Opportunity High School finishes her speech, welcoming the entire student body to a new semester and encouraging them to excel and achieve.

10:02 a.m. The students get up to leave the auditorium for their next class.

10:03 a.m. The auditorium doors won't open.

10:05 a.m. Someone starts shooting.

Told from four different perspectives over the span of fifty-four harrowing minutes, terror reigns as one student’s calculated revenge turns into the ultimate game of survival."

Goodreads - This Is Where It Ends

I was shopping with one of my friends in Hastings and I saw this book.  It had an interesting cover (yes, I judge books by their cover) and I decided to read the inside flap to get a glimpse into what the book was about.  There was just enough to pull me in and I ended up purchasing the book.  I put this book on the shelf and somewhat forgot about it.

Fast forward about three weeks.  It was finally spring break and I had been reading books non-stop.  If I wasn't reading then I was sleeping or eating.  I often start books late in the evening and typically get caught up in them which causes me to stay up reading until three or four in the morning.  I picked up this book one evening and I couldn't stop reading it.  It was kind of like driving by an accident.  You don't want to look at the carnage, but you look anyways.  This was the same situation.  I wanted to put the book down and go to sleep, but I couldn't do it.  I read until it was about 4:30 in the morning and I finally forced myself to put the book down and go to bed.  I woke up the next morning and I finally continued reading where I had left off.  I finished this book a few hours later.

I have NEVER had a book haunt me like this one did.  This book is about a student who locks his fellow classmates in an auditorium after a school assembly.  Then the unthinkable happens...he starts shooting.  The story is told by four students who are in different locations at the school during the shooting.  As the shooting is unfolding we get glimpses into the past and the past is pieced together where we can finally see why this maniac would start a school shooting.  I don't want to ruin the ending, but it ended exactly like I expected it would.  This book is full of details that are vividly graphic and unsettling.

This book was a very heavy read and it was very hard to let go.  The night after finishing the book I had one of the most vivid dreams I've ever had.  I had a dream that there was a murder suicide in the bedroom next to mine.  I was the one who discovered the bodies and had to call the police.  My family and I had to evacuate our house due to it being a crime scene.  But before we left I had to go get something out of a room which required me to walk past the blood stained room with the bodies still inside.  I remember having to force myself to wake up because I was having a nightmare.  I woke up in a cold sweat and couldn't go back to sleep.

As an educator this is one of my biggest fears.  We go through training to prepare for this kind of event.  Our doors have secure locks and we have certain procedures and protocol that we are supposed to follow.  However, after reading this book you really see how unpredictable a school shooting can be.

This book haunted my dreams.  While it was a book that vividly painted the realistic nature of a school shooting, it was one that I wouldn't read again.  I wouldn't recommend it to educators, because honestly, it terrified me.  I would give this book 2.5/5 stars because of the intensity of the content.  I didn't expect it to impact me the way it did, but it definitely reached into my core and touched it.  After reading this book I quickly sold it to a resale store because I didn't want it sitting on my shelf.  If you are into the school shooting genre then this book is perfect for you, but if you don't want all the gory details, then don't read this!