Tell Me Exactly What Happened
By Caroline Burau. (Minnesota Historical Society Press, 184 pages, $16.95.)
In her second memoir for the MHS Press about working as a police dispatcher, Caroline Burau is snappy, compassionate and funny. And she really needs to pee.
Burau was police and fire dispatcher for White Bear Lake, working one-person shifts that were either draggingly quiet or ridiculously, impossibly busy — no time for bathroom breaks, and no one to cover for her.
Later, she went to work as a dispatcher for an ambulance service. In this fast-paced, sassy book, she tells about the phone calls she fields in both jobs: the pneumonia case that was actually an ammonia leak (she misheard), the bomb threats, the shootings, the children. Oh, the children will break your heart.
She is fiercely loyal to the police and firefighters, acknowledging that some are jerks and some are racist but maintaining that most are dedicated to the job. They "could just encounter an active shooter and be required, in that moment, to sacrifice" their lives. "For about two bucks more an hour than what I make. I'll take the pay cut."
Burau's book launch will be at 7 p.m. Sept. 8 at Common Good Books, 38 S. Snelling Av., St. Paul. She will also read and sign books at 10 a.m. Oct. 14 at Lake Country Booksellers, White Bear Lake.
LAURIE HERTZEL
Counting the Days While My Mind Slips Away
By Ben Utecht, with Mark Tabb. (Howard Books/Simon & Schuster, 256 pages, $26.)
Concussions ended Ben Utecht's career in professional football, sending him home after four seasons as a tight end with the NFL and four as a Minnesota Golden Gopher. In his memoir, "Counting the Days While My Mind Slips Away" (written with Mark Tabb), Utecht writes about growing up in Minnesota, playing for the U, being signed by the Indianapolis Colts, earning a Super Bowl ring in 2006, moving over to the Cincinnati Bengals.
Utecht is a preacher's son, and his is a sincere and sentimental book. He proposed to his future wife by burying a ring in a cup of rose petals. They remained abstinent until their wedding night. He wept when his wife told him she was pregnant. He's a total sap when it comes to his four daughters.