Can't Buy Me Love (Based on a True Story)

Sweet Hereafter has been a great book to read because it tackles ethical and legal issues in a small community like the one we are currently living in. This book is also emotionally very heavy and I wondered what inspired Russel Banks to write about this particular story. The reason I was curious is because Dolores' recollections were so specific; she references roads, trail heads, and peaks. This reminded me of the phrase, "writers write what they know." Obviously, Banks knows this town because he has lived in Upstate New York, but did a terrible accident happen near him in his town too?

 I did some research and found that the novel was based on an actual accident that occurred in Alton, Texas on September 21st 1989.  In this crash 19 students were killed, 64 injured. A coco-cola delivery truck crashed into a school bus which plunged it into a 40 foot deep water chasm. It impossible not to think of the children, not all alive, pulled out of the water in front of their parents' eyes. Both drivers survived the accident, the Coco-Cola truck driver claimed that the truck's brakes failed. Lawyers immediately fled to the scene and advised families to take legal action. If you want to read more on it, here is an article about the event: Alton, Texas Bus Accident

This was a devastating event for the town. Many families lost young loved ones. A loss like this is always difficult to navigate through and impossible to completely comprehend. After the accident, as in Banks' book, lawyers came into the scene advising families to take legal action. This did not allow families to have a decent amount of time to cope with and grasp their loss. Instead they were forced to respond to the situation with anger rather than remorse.  Lawyers acted as if monetary compensation could help them deal with their loss but in the end, after the law suits were closed, the families did not feel closure.

Banks changes the story a by creating the character Nichole who technically ends the case, making monetary compensation an impossible result. In this story, the families are allowed the time to deal with their grief and accept the unchangeable fate of the situation unlike the actual families in Alton.