Get This Book

In reading his book, Rescuing Providence, the thing that stands out most to me is Mike Morse's refusal to complain.
Not that I would blame him if he did.
A Lieutenant on the Providence (RI) Fire Department and assigned to the EMS division, the book follows Morse on a 38-hour shift in a busy urban 911 system.
The litany of calls is familiar.
The patient names may be different, but Morse could have just as easily been writing about Worcester, or Lawrence, or Lowell or a dozen other New England cities still trying to recover in the 21st century from the erosion of the 19th century manufacturing economies that were once their foundations.
What's different is that Morse obviously loves his job, and has genuine compassion for those particular patients, like the frequent fliers and drunks we all deal with, who would be much easier to hate.
He occasionally questions why he continues to work in such a busy system when relief is just a simple transfer request away.
In his book, Morse comes back with the simplest of answers -- he loves working on the ambulance.
I know Mike reads this site, so I hope he won't mind if I give his book a huge plug.
I started Rescuing Providence at 9 a.m. on a recent morning and read it in one sitting, not because it's short but because I couldn't put it down.
Along with Peter Canning's two books (Paramedic and Rescue 471), Morse's is the best I've read about EMS and I highly recommend it.
Check it out at the Paladin Press Web site , or follow the link on my blog to Morse's Rescuing Providence blog to order.
It'll be the best 22 bucks you'll spend this month.