Susan Kushner Resnick Articles

The Washington Post's Lisa Bonos has published a positive review of Susan Kushner Resnick's GOODBYE WIFES AND DAUGHTERS. Bonos emphasizes the timelessness of Resnick's depiction of an all-too-familiar tragedy:

The coal-mining tragedy depicted in "Goodbye Wifes and Daughters" occurred nearly 70 years ago but is still an eerily familiar storyline in 2010. While mine safety and regulation have vastly improved, recent headlines out of West Virginia make journalist Susan Kushner Resnick's excavation of the 1943 explosion that killed 75 men in Bearcreek, Mont., seem not so distant from present-day disasters.

Read the entire review here.

In an op-ed for the Charleston Gazette, Gordon Simmons reviews the new book from Susan Kushner Resnick, GOODBYE WIFES AND DAUGHTERS.  Simmons says Kushner's story "shows how tragedy repeats."

CHARLESTON, W.Va -- Like any great tragedy, West Virginia's explosion and deaths at Upper Big Branch mine captured the attention of the nation. But after the last funerals, investigations by safety experts and legislative hearings are done, it will likely fade from the national memory into a cold statistic occasionally found in official and historical documents.

This consideration makes Susan Kushner Resnick's new book, "Goodbye Wifes and Daughters," all the more timely. The disaster she chronicles is eerily similar to the one West Virginia just witnessed.

You can read the rest of the article here.

Mine Explosion Echoes Tragedy From Long Ago

by Steve Pendlebury, AOL News

"(April 8) -- When Susan Kushner Resnick heard the news that at least 25 West Virginia coal miners had died in an explosion, she "just started to cry."

Tragedy struck a few weeks after "Goodbye Wifes and Daughters," Resnick's book about Montana's worst coal mining catastrophe, was published. The events unfolding at the Upper Big Branch Mine were all too reminiscent of her heartbreaking story about the blast at the Smith Mine in Bearcreek that killed 74 men in 1943.

"I just thought, 'Again?' And then I got angry," Resnick said. "Why does this keep happening? What lesson are we not learning?"

A mine with a history of safety violations, an owner accused of valuing profits over lives, a methane explosion -- followed by the agony of families waiting for answers. "All of that happens in...

From the Boston Globe: Mine disasters and money

By Susan Kushner Resnick, the author of “Goodbye Wifes and Daughters,’’ the story of the Smith coal mine disaster of 1943

"ANOTHER YEAR, another group of men killed in a coal mine. You already know the story, because it rarely changes. Inspectors discover violations. Mine operators ignore them. Miners work through the danger because they need to make a living. Gas builds up and explodes. Some men die instantly from the force of the blast, and some die from the carbon monoxide. There are always a few unaccounted for or trapped, and those mysteries keep everyone’s hope alive for a while. Then, usually, they die, too.

This is what happened Monday in the Upper Big Branch Mine in Whitesville, West Virginia. Though the specifics have yet to be revealed, these are the uncontested facts: 25 miners died after an explosion. And Massey Energy, a firm notorious...