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There are many things that separate literary journalism from investigative reporting. Blackhawk Down fits into many of the traits that do. For one thing, Mark Bowden has obviously done a great deal of background research, he was not in Somalia on October 3, 1993, and yet he describes the scene in great detail. For example, he depicts the target house as “flat-roofed, with three rear stories and two front stories. It was shaped like an L, with a small courtyard enclosed by a high stone wall. In front moved cars, people and donkey carts.” Illustrating the moment before the Rangers move in, Bowden describes “3-inch-thick nylon ropes,” which “were coiled before the doors. When they were finally pushed out, one dropped down on a car. This delayed things further.” Bowden’s ability to convey such small details shows that he spent a good deal of time interviewing the various participants and researching their exact movements. The details in the book are so specific that a reader might question whether anyone could remember such small things accurately in the middle of a scene as chaotic as the one described. The reader must trust him to convey what the soldiers have told him they saw, heard, smelt, thought, felt. It is not likely that every line of dialogue in the story mimics word-for-word what was set on the scene. For example, after Todd Blackburn gets hurt in the first chapter, Matt Eversmann radios Lt. Perino and says, “Listen, we really need to move this guy or he is going to die.
Approximate Word count = 1026
Approximate Pages = 4.1
(250 words per page double spaced)
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