Torched
How a City Was Left to Burn, and the Olympic Rush to Rebuild L.A.
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- Pre-Order
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- Expected May 12, 2026
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
CBS News correspondent Jonathan Vigliotti’s searing firsthand account of the 2025 Los Angeles wildfires, the failures that fueled the catastrophe, and the high-stakes battle over how the city will rebuild ahead of the 2028 Olympic Games.
In Torched, Vigliotti brings readers inside the inferno that devastated Los Angeles, weaving on-the-ground reporting with the deeper story of how a century of unchecked development and political mismanagement set the stage for disaster. With clarity and verve, he recounts the chaos of the fire, the flawed emergency response, and the human stories of survival and loss in the city he loves.
But this is more than a chronicle of destruction. Vigliotti unravels this catastrophe by placing it within the larger history of Los Angeles, a city that has in many ways been defined by its attraction to reinvention and deference to those who “move fast and break things”—an impulse that now puts it at risk of a short-sighted post-fire rebuild in the run-up to the 2028 Olympic Games. A future that might maximize profits but could potentially do too little to prevent similar disasters in the future or address the rampant inequities this blaze brought to global attention.
Urgent, unflinching, and deeply reported, Torched captures Los Angeles at a turning point—and reveals why its choices matter for us all.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
CBS News correspondent Vigliotti (Before It's Gone) offers a riveting account of the 2025 Palisades fire and the shocking governmental failures that fueled it. The book opens a day into the disaster, with L.A. mayor Karen Bass and California governor Gavin Newsom apparently more concerned with rebuilding in time for the 2028 Olympics than fighting the still raging inferno, let alone questioning what had caused it. Leaping back in time, the author provides a gripping hour-by-hour recap of the week leading up to the January 7 blaze, portraying it as a perfect storm of incompetence. As dire warnings mounted, Mayor Bass left the country, Emergency Management director Carol Parks seemingly took the weekend off, and fire chief Crowley failed to recall off-duty firefighters, which "could have doubled staffing." Vigliotti shares his firsthand experiences covering the disaster, from his disbelief at seeing tree-cutters working as the fire already raged ("It's like they thought they had today to prepare") to his efforts to save one resident's stranded dogs. He also juxtaposes the governmental ineptitude and resulting chaos—panicked families fleeing on foot from gridlocked traffic; residents defending their homes with garden hoses while shouting "Where are the firefighters?"—with the foresight and preparedness of businessman Rick Caruso's private firefighting team, which successfully defended his shopping center. It adds up to a dystopian account of a government's disregard for the well-being of its people.
