In An Instant: A Family's Journey of Love and Healing

IN AN INSTANT A Family's Journey of Love and Healing

BY LEE AND BOB 'WOODRUFF RANDOM HOUSE 2007, 289 PAGES, $25.95

The adage that if anything can go wrong, it will go wrong, finds its classic example in the case of ABO news anchor Bob Woodruff. In December 2006, he was promoted to the national news anchor position of Peter Jennings, who died from lung cancer. He had worked his way up to the top through years of apprenticeship. He has been a lawyer, indeed taught American law in Beijing during the Tiananmen Square uprising, changed careers to enter the world of TV journalism, traveled abroad extensively, including going to Iraq on assignment five times. Woodward is fluent in Mandarin Chinese and a number of other languages and seemed the perfect replacement for the internationally known Jennings.

Then, in January 2007, the roof fell in. He was on assignment in Iraq, embedded with American troops, together with his cameraman Doug Vogt and other crew members. Sent there to get a story, the news anchor himself became that story. He and Vogt went on a tour with Iraqi troops, using an old Russian tank as their vehicle. The last thing he knew was that he heard a tremendous explosion and was himself another victim of the misnomer "war on terror" Severely injured by the IED (improvised explosive device)--responsible for 70% of the wounds of our service men and women--much of his skull was injured. Eventually, almost one third of it was replaced by a prosthesis. He suffered eye and brain damage, and had more than 100 pieces of dirt and shrapnel in his shoulder, neck, and head area. A rocky particle went into his neck to lodge dangerously against the carotid artery. Bleeding profusely, he was stabilized, half of his skull being removed to allow the swollen brain to expand. He was put in a medically induced coma and did not know what was happening for over a month. From the Army hospital in Iraq, he was transferred to the Landstuhl Germany Army hospital, and from there to the Navy's Bethesda hospital in Maryland, eventually winding up in New York for further rehabilitation. One must remark on the quality of the medical services received.

This book is coauthored by Woodruff and his wife Lee, who was the driving force behind it. She is a public relations specialist and freelance writer, as well as the mother of four children. (One can only marvel--perhaps the word is wonder or question--how these multitasking woman manage to do it all.) She tells of receiving the tragic phone call of the accident while vacationing with her children at Disney World and shares with us her reaction to the entire ordeal. A strong woman, she regarded herself as a general who could handle things. It nearly was her undoing, but she received great support from members of her family and Bob's. The format of the book is unusual in that Lee writes a several-page passage and then Bob chips in with his views. Along the way, we are led back and forth into different time periods. This leap-frogging is clever, but hurts the book's continuity.

Essentially, it entails a story of their meeting at Colgate University, their first dates, Bob earning an added law degree, their getting married, and the raising of their four small children. The writing style is intimate and the reader feels one with the family in the phone conversations, during hospital visitations, and in the various stages of recovery, as well as in assessing what the future might bring. The story is extremely graphic, as are some of the photos, and it is not a book for the faint-hearted. Many of us have had those kinds of fateful phone calls and empathize with Lee.

The question of recovery, full or partial, was a delicate one and the doctors were their usual professional selves, essentially telling the truth, but not quite all of it. The coauthoring of the book proved therapeutic for both-indeed, for the entire family. As Lee puts it, the book is "about a marriage, a family, a crisis, and a recovery" How well that recovery goes, only time will tell, as such a trauma has lifetime effects. Lee optimistically concludes that, "We healed each other" Throughout this well-written book lies the unwritten question of why, why, why? No answer is forthcoming.

Reviewed by

GERALD F. KREYCHE

American Thought Editor

COPYRIGHT 2007 Society for the Advancement of Education
COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning