Answering 911: Life in the Hot Seat

By Caroline Burau

Book Overview

You answer a call from a fourteen-year-old boy asking for someone to arrest his mother, who is smoking crack in their bathroom. You talk with him until the cops arrive, making sure there are no weapons around and learning that his favorite subject in school is lunch. Five minutes later, you have to deal with someone complaining about his neighbor's clarinet practice. What is it like to be on the receiving end of desperate calls for help . . . every day? Caroline Burau, a former newspaper reporter and nursing student who couldn't stand the sight of blood, takes a job as an emergency dispatcher because she likes helping people. But on-the-job training at the comm center proves to be more than she bargained for. As she adjusts to a daily life of catastrophe and comedy, domestics and drunks, cops and robbers, junk food and sarcasm, lost cats and suicides, she discovers that crisis can become routine, that coworkers can be mean--that she must continue to care and, at times, learn how to let go.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0873515692
• ISBN13: 9780873515696
• Release Date: August 2006
• Publisher: Borealis Books
• Length: 216 Pages
• Weight: 1.00 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.5" x 0.8" x 5.5"

Customer Reviews

Life on the other end of the 911 phone call...

This was one of those "staff picks" at the library that catches your eye as you're trying to check out the books you *did* come in for... Answering 911: Life in the Hot Seat by Caroline Burau. Since it was relatively short and had a sufficiently quirky premise, I picked it up. It turned out to be one of the more entertaining reads I had this year. Contents: What It's Like; Destiny, or Something; On-the-Job Training; Joe Wilson; Power Phones; Lily; Good Neighbors; Friends in High Places; Anniversary; Jurisdiction; My Marsha; Kristen; Coppers; Hostages; Smucked; On the Night Shift; That Loving Feeling; Just Too Silly; changes; Words; On Burnout; The Parenting Option; On Wannabes; DOA; The Job; Retirement; Wherever You Go; Full Circle; Acknowledgements Burau has led a far different life than most of us... She was somewhat of an outsider growing up, and ended up getting hooked on crack. This addiction, fed by her boyfriend, culminated with her doing a few days in a Florida jail when she was busted for "loitering", just moments before they were supposed to be picking up some product. She took a hard look at what she had become, and ended up going back home to start over. Her nursing career ended in college when she would get queasy over blood. Her career as a reporter wasn't working out much better. One day while following a story at the police station, she was encouraged to apply for a job as a 911 operator. Surprisingly, her drug background didn't discourage the interviewers, and she started a new life on the desk of a small-town emergency response agency. She's a great writer, so you quickly get sucked into her struggles to learn the lingo, the multiple terminals and switchboards, and the processes that are necessary to make sure the right people are sent out to the right incidents. She also shares the pain of having someone die on the other end of the line, and the agony of trying to know if you were the cause of it. She also ends up knowing far more about her neighbors than she wished she knew, and soon everyone she sees has some sort of background story that she can't just pretend didn't happen. Other than the sheer entertainment factor of the book, it also made me think about those people who are on the other end of the phone line when we dial 911. We don't have a clue as to the stress and pressure they're under, and how each day exposes them to more ugliness and insanity than most of us experience in a lifetime. You almost want to dial 911 and just say "thanks for being there", except that they have other more important calls to take. :) Well written, funny, and interesting... Definitely worth a read.

Wonderful

This book was wonderful!! It grabs ahold of you and makes you see the light of just how being a dispatcher is. I am one and she hits it right on! Way to go Caroline!!

So real - lets the reader know they are not alone

I purchased this book for some light reading and ended up sharing it with my entire center. It doesn't matter where you work - as 911 Dispatchers the same issues are faced, the sames jokes are told, and the same fellings are felt!! Should be required reading before a candidate sits for the civil service exam!!

Extremely accurate portrayal of 911 dispatchers

Having worked as a 911 dispatcher, I cannot say enough good things about Ms. Burau's book. It is difficult to put into words what the job is like, the sorts of feelings and experiences dispatchers get, and Ms. Burau does an amazing job of explaining it. I found myself nodding in agreement (or laughing out loud,) seeing my own experiences in the events she narrates. By no means is her account a whitewash or festival of warm fuzzies; some of the events she describes (and her and other dispatchers' reactions to those events) may be shocking or disturbing to those who haven't been there. This doesn't make those events or reactions any less real, or any less common in other police departments or dispatch centers. Dispatchers are sometimes overlooked in the organization of police departments; many people assume the person they speak to on the other end of 911 is a police officer. Ms. Burau does an exceedingly good job of opening up this sub-society. Highly recommended, both for laypersons outside the field who want to understand what it's like in a 911 comm center, and for dispatchers who want a mostly humorous, sympathetic look at what we choose to do for a living. This is the best written account of 911 dispatching I've read.

I couldn't put this book down!

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The tales of real life drama unfolding in Caroline Burau's ear as a 911 operator are rivetting. The author's description is so vivid I felt like I was there listening to the calls myself. Besides drama at work, the author touches upon her own personal journey with life on the dark side and reveals how she can connect all to well with some of her callers. Her candor, wit, and attention to detail kept me glued to my book!