A Safeway in Arizona: What the Gabrielle Giffords Shooting Tells Us about the Grand Canyon State and Life in America

A riveting account of the state of Arizona, seen through the lens of the Tucson shootings. On January 8, 2011, twenty-two-year-old Jared Lee Loughner opened fire at a Tucson meet and greet held by US representative Gabrielle Giffords. The incident left six people dead and thirteen injured, including Giffords, whom he shot in the head. Award-winning author and fifth-generation Arizonan Tom Zoellner, a longtime friend of Giffords and a field organizer on her congressional campaign, uses the tragedy as a jumping-off point to expose the fault lines in Arizona's political and socioeconomic landscape that allowed this to happen: the harmful political rhetoric, the inept state government, the lingering effects of the housing market s boom and bust, the proliferation and accessibility of guns, the lack of established communities, and the hysteria surrounding issues of race and immigration. Zoellner offers a revealing portrait of the southwestern state at a critical moment in history and as a symbol of the nation s discontents and uncertainties. Ultimately, it is his rallying cry for a saner, more civil way of life.