A school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, involving young children has reignited the national US debate about access to firearms. So, what does the data tell us about gun culture and its impact? Firearms deaths are a fixture in American life."

The international press responded scathingly to the tolerance for gun violence in the US: with titles such as “America is killing itself” and ‘nothing fundamentally changes’.

Even in devastated Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said he was “deeply saddened by the murder of innocent children”, adding that his people “share the pain of the relatives and friends of the victims, and of all Americans”.

So, the discussion goes on (and on).... and as Australians we may never fully understand American ways (as much as they may never understand ours) however books do provide that first step to a deeper analysis and understanding of how others live, perceive and be.

From the Time 100 must read books for 2021, we have America on Fire by Elizabeth Hinton. In this book, Yale professor of history Elizabeth Hinton revisits the long history of Black rebellion in America on Fire: The Untold History of Police Violence and Black Rebellion Since the 1960s.

Reading books benefits both your physical and mental health, and those benefits can last a lifetime. They begin in early childhood and continue through the senior years.

Time to flip through some pages