A People Magazine Top 10 Book of the Year * “A riveting private narrative…hard to put down.” — Newsweek On September 11, 2001, Marian Fontana lost her husband, a firefighter from the elite Squad 1 in Brooklyn, in the World Trade Center attack. A Widow's Walk begins that fateful morning, when Marian, a playwright and comedienne, became a widow, a single mother, and an unlikely activist. On September 11, I dropped my son off at his second full day of kindergarten. The sky was so blue it looked as if it had been ironed. I crossed the street, ordered coffee, and sat to wait for my husband to meet me. It was our eighth wedding anniversary and Dave and I were about to begin a new chapter in our seventeen years together. Sipping coffee, I watched as a line of thick black smoke crept across the sky from Manhattan, oblivious to the fact that my life was about to change forever. Two weeks after 9/11, the city attempted to close Squad 1, which had suffered the loss of twelve men. Known for her feisty spirit and passionate loyalty, Marian, who was still reeling from her profound loss, began to mobilize the neighborhood to keep the firehouse open. From this unlikely platform the 9/11 Widows and Victims' Families Association grew. Over the next twelve months, Marian struggled with the tragedy's endless ripple effects, from the minute and deeply personal—she wonders who will play Star Wars with her son, Aidan, and carry him on his shoulders; to the collective: she works to get families and widows necessary information about the recovery effort and attends private meetings with Governor Pataki, Mayor Giuliani, Senator Clinton, and Mayor Bloomberg. Through it all, Marian's irrepressible humor is her best armor, as well as evidence of her buoyant strength. Written with great heart and humanity, A Widow's Walk is a timely opportunity for remembrance and a timeless testament to love's loss and the resilience of the human spirit. "Compelling, gorgeously detailed and unsparingly honest. . . . Fontana's gifts for storytelling, dialogue and characterization make the memoir a pleasure to read, even as it rips you apart." -- Marion Winik, Newsday "The author's passionate, irreverent persona comes through on every page. Her book has the addictive appeal of a smartly paced novel, and readers will close it wanting more." -- Michelle Green, People "Picks & Pans" "A Widow's Walk manages to make an exhaustively covered public event into a riveting private narrative. . . . Hard to put down. . . it's the everyday humanity that makes [Marian] Fontana's story so real." -- Cathleen McGuigan, Newsweek Marian Fontana, an accomplished comedian, actress, and writer, is the president of the 9/11 Widows and Victims' Families Association. She lives in Staten Island, New York. 1 The Day My eyes creak open and try to read the red numbers, blinking 8:15 A.M. A surge of panic rushes through me. I am late for my son's second full day of kindergarten. I should have laid out his clothes and packed his lunch the night before, but the organizational gene is recessive in my family. I scramble into his room to find him a clean shirt. "Aidan! Wake up!" I yell. Aidan is sleeping in the middle room of our small floor-through apartment. When he was a baby, I would tiptoe through his room so carefully, it reminded me of scenes from the movie Kung Fu , trying to walk on rice paper without making an indent. Even at five years old, Aidan still looks like a baby, his mouth hanging wide, cheeks flushed red like tempera paint. I watch the soothing rhythm of his chest rise and fall and I stop to fill my own lungs with gratefulness. "C'mon! We're late!" Aidan stirs and I rush into the kitchen to make lunch and call Dave at the firehouse on Union Street, eight blocks away. Last night we tried to have our usual eleven o'clock phone call, but the Squad's PA system was broken. Everything was accompanied by a deafening sound resembling a bee caught in a microphone. "I can't talk," he'd said. "This noise is driving me crazy." "Ten more hours and you'll be on vacation for a month," I reminded him before hanging up. Dave wasn't supposed to be at work, but I had insisted he switch shifts to have our anniversary off. Dave was excited by our plans to go to the Whitney Museum today. Now that Aidan was in school, he could pursue his art again, maybe even apprentice with someone well known. He was also considering massage school or going back to college to get a master's in history. He had lists of projects and ideas scratched on paper all over the house, ways to supplement his meager income until he was promoted. Aidan shuffles into the kitchen and sinks into a chair. "I'm tired," he complains, plopping his head into his folded arms. I kiss his hair, inhaling the scent of sweat and baby shampoo, and dial the firehouse. "Squad One. Firefighter Fontana speaking." "Hey. Happy anniversary," I say. "You, too." He sounds exhausted. Ever s