When the Dust Settles

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What to expect

Lucy Easthope lives with disaster every day. When a plane crashes, a bomb explodes, a city floods or a pandemic begins, she's the one they call.

Lucy is a world-leading authority on recovering from disaster. She has been at the centre of the most seismic events of the last few decades, advising on everything from the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami to the 7/7 bombings, the Christchurch earthquake in New Zealand, the Grenfell fire and the Covid-19 pandemic. In every catastrophe, Lucy is there to pick up the pieces and prepare for the next one. She holds governments to account, helps communities rally together, returns personal possessions to families, and holds the hands of the survivors.

In her moving memoir she reveals what happens in the aftermath and explores how we pick up and rebuild with strength and perseverance. She takes us behind the police tape to scenes of destruction and chaos, introducing us to victims and their families, but also to the government briefing rooms and bunkers, where confusion and stale biscuits can reign supreme. Telling her own personal story, Lucy looks back at a life spent on the edges of disaster, from a Liverpudlian childhood steeped in the Hillsborough tragedy to the many losses and loves of her career.

With wisdom, resilience and candour, When the Dust Settles lifts us up by showing that humanity, hope and humour can - and must - be found on the darkest days.

(P) 2022 Hodder & Stoughton Limited

Critics Review

  • Never less than reassuringly humane… She shows and tells and, vitally, cares.

    Telegraph

  • An unlikely superhero… this gripping memoir is full of compassion. A remarkable insight into the decisions involved in disaster planning.

    Sunday Times

  • Easthope, whether she knows it or not, is that rare thing, a genuine philosopher thinking through what she is actually doing in the mitigation of human suffering.

    New Statesman

  • The disasters recalled here often read like short stories, each of them filled with high drama, surreal twists and mysteries to be solved.

    Guardian

  • ‘A remarkable account…This should be a dark and depressing read; that it isn’t, that it is ultimately hopeful and uplifting, is down to the utter human decency that the author represents’

    Mail on Sunday

  • An essential, uplifting read, brimming with humanity, humility and humour.

    Sue Black

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