Friendly Fire: A Fractured Memoir

A powerful, gut-wrenching tale of pain, suffering, and recovery. KIRKUS REVIEWS

Unique and haunting. A mesmerizing and unforgettable meditation on a stranger-than-fiction tragedy. PUBLISHERS WEEKLY STARRED REVIEW

One month before his college graduation, Paul Rousseau is accidentally shot in the head by his roommate and best friend.

At some point in the course of Paul and Marks friendship, Mark acquiredlegally and with required permitsfive firearms. Those weapons lived with them in their college apartment. It was a non-issue for the two best friends. They were inseparable. They were twenty-two-year-old boys at the height of their college experience, unaware that everything was about to change forever.

The bullet ripped through two walls before it struck Pauls skull. Mark had accidentally pulled the trigger while in the other room andfrightened for his own futuredelayed getting treatment for Paul, who miraculously remained conscious the entire time. In vivid detail, and balanced with refreshing moments of humor, Friendly Fire brings us into the world of both the shooting itself and its surgical counterpointthe dark spaces of survival in the face of a traumatic brain injury and into the paranoid, isolating, dehumanizing maw of personal injury cases.

Friendly Fire is the story of a friendshipboth its formation and its destruction. Through phenomenal writing and gripping detail, Paul reveals a compelling and inspirational story that speaks to much of contemporary American life.