Massacre in Newtown

Book excerpt: Henry Berry lives about 20 miles south of Newtown in Fairfield County. A lifelong resident of Connecticut, like many others across the country, he was shocked, alarmed, and confused by the scale and savagery of the shootings of more than 20 children and adults in Newtown on December 14, 2012. His book "Massacre in Newtown - Adam Lanza's Dark Passage to Madness" is an effort to try to gain a grasp of this horrible event for whatever consolation and peace this may offer. "Massacre in Newtown" analyzes and evaluates many details of actions and decisions Adam Lanza is known to have made leading up to the moment when he burst into Sandy Hook Elementary School heavily armed to murder so many helpless, trapped individuals. Published before the completion and release of the unofficial Connecticut report on the massacre, in taking up widely-reported, confirmed facts of the event and its timeline, this early study is germane and insightful. Drawing on his lifelong pursuits of psychology, literary studies, art criticism, philosophy, and cultural studies for "Massacre in Newtown - Adam Lanza's Dark Passage to Madness," Henry Berry uncovers sources and follows the process eventuating in an unspeakable, unimaginable episode of madness.