FDR famously said “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Rebecca Solnit demonstrates how true this is in her new nonfiction book A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities that Arise in Disaster.

Through an in-depth examination of five major North American disasters — the San Francisco earthquake of 1906; the 1917 explosion in Halifax, Nova Scotia; the 1985 Mexico City earthquake; the 9/11 attack in 2001; and Hurricane Katrina in 2005 — Solnit reveals how people really behave when normal rules of society are suspended in the wake of tragedy — with spontaneous altruism, self-organization and mutual aid — vs. the how people are widely (and falsely) believed to behave in these circumstances (with violence, sexual assault and the hoarding of resources).

She also demonstrates why promoting the idea that people will behave badly in the aftermath of a disaster actually creates that behavior; and why government intervention (or lack thereof) has historically made the situation worse, not better.

I originally picked up this book because I’ve long had an interest in how people behave in unusual or life-or-death situations, and because I’ve had a few brushes with disasters myself (although none as devastating as the ones described in the book), including the Mt. St. Helens eruption in 1980 (fortunately, I lived far enough away that we just had to deal with the ash); the 1994 Northridge earthquake (I was staying in a hotel in L.A. and had to run down 22 flights of stairs in pajamas without my contacts in); a tornado in Fargo, ND in 1996 (I was just driving through); and the 2001 Nisqually earthquake — one of the worst quakes we’ve had in the Seattle area in a long time (I was at the top of a tall building in downtown Seattle when it happened).

I also live in the shadow of North America’s largest dormant volcano, Mt. Rainier. There are Volcano Evacuation Route signs posted throughout my neighborhood, with warnings from local newscasters at least once a year that we are overdue for a catastrophic eruption. (I don’t spend much time worrying about this, but I also won’t be surprised to wake up one morning and find a fast-moving lahar with my name on it, since I seem to be a magnet for disasters.)

But you don’t have to live in a disaster-prone area to find this book inspiring, and useful.

In fact, given the ongoing threats posed by global warming, terrorist attacks, and the Swine flu, this should be required reading for all Americans, if for no other reason than to dispel the myths that lead people to behave in terrible ways after a disaster, like the handful of white New Orleans residents who shot any black man who moved during the Katrina aftermath because of false reports about rape and looting.