Scars, Spirit of Hope, 5:41 rank one-two-three on Amazon list

I would be lying if I said I hadn't hoped this would happen at some point.

The new book, Scars from the Tornado: One Year at Joplin East Middle School, and the two books I co-authored with Carthage Press Managing Editor John Hacker, 5:41: Stories from the Joplin Tornado and Spirit of Hope: The Year After the Joplin Tornado, are ranked one-two-three on the Amazon.com rankings among the 13 books about the tornado that are available on Amazon.

John Hacker and I set out to chronicle the stories of the tornado in 5:41 and then realized the story would not be complete without writing about Joplin's amazing recovery and that book became Spirit of Hope.

I promised from the first that money from 5:41 would be used to tell the tornado stories of East Middle School students and the first year in our warehouse school and that happened earlier this month when Scars from the Tornado was published.

Unless some mainstream publisher wants to put the three books together, or combine 5:41 and Spirit of Hope, I am finished writing about the Joplin Tornado, except, of course, on the Turner Report.

The rankings for this week are listed below:

1. Scars from the Tornado, Randy Turner, 62,978
2. Spirit of Hope, Randy Turner and John Hacker 79,784
3. 5:41: Stories from the Joplin Tornado, Randy Turner and John Hacker 441,337
4. Joplin 5:41, Kansas City Star, 500,589
5. Singing Over Me, Danielle Stammer, 709,998
6. When the Storm Passes, Julie Jett, 738,990
7. 32 Minutes in May, Joplin Globe, 815,533
8. When the Sirens Were Silent, Mike Smith, 892,079
9. Miracle of the Human Spirit, Mark Rohr, 1,174,021
10. 5/22: Stories of Survival, Stories of Faith, Scott Hettinger, 1,533,808
11. Joplin Tornado House of Hope, Tim Bartow, 1,980,608
12. EF-5 at 5:35, Kathryn Sandlin, 3,692,825
13. Mayday in Joplin, Donald Clugston, 3,806,484