Masterful novel captures the ongoing trauma of Columbine

By Wally Lamb. HarperCollins, €18 The Hour I First Believed

On the morning of April 20, 1999, one of Wally Lamb’s lead characters, Maureen Quirk, is hiding in an under-the-counter cupboard in the library of Columbine High School, Colorado, certain she is about to die.

Steps away from Maureen, two heavily armed students ridicule their fellow students, taunting and teasing them before - with derisory hoots - they shoot them dead. Maureen can ...