The Widower’s Notebook

TK Podcast: Interview with Jonathan Santlofer and Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich

The grief over the sudden death of his wife Joy compelled novelist Jonathan Santlofer to begin writing, and those scribbled thoughts and memories became his beautiful memoir, THE WIDOWER’S NOTEBOOK. He and James discuss losing the first person you want to share stories with, not letting yourself off the hook, falling in love with a cat, relying on process, and, ultimately, refusing to live in the shadows. Plus, Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich on the response to their book, THE FACT OF A BODY. Listen to full podcast here

WAMC Public Radio: Interview with Jonathan Santlofer

Jonathan Santlofer is a writer and artist. His debut novel, “The Death Artist,” was an international bestseller, translated into seventeen languages, and is currently in development for screen adaptation. His fourth novel, “Anatomy of Fear,” won the Nero Award for best novel of 2009. His short stories have appeared in numerous anthologies. He is also the creator and editor of several anthologies including “It Occurs to Me That I Am America,” a collection of original stories and art. His paintings and drawings are included in many public and private collections. WAMC Northeast Public Radio Interview by Joe Donahue Listen to full interview here

Signature Reads: The Language of Grief

I measure every Grief I meet With narrow, probing, eyes – I wonder if It weighs like Mine – Or has an Easier size.” Emily Dickinson, #561 The English word “grief” is derived from the Old French verb “grever,” which means “to burden.” Implicit in the word is the idea that it is a weight to be borne; as Dickinson alluded to in her poem, “I measure every grief I meet.” And yet the notion of a weightiness to grief does not cover the morass of emotions that accompany this profound sense of loss. While Elizabeth Kubler Ross stamped order onto grief by describing the five stages a person moved through on the way to what we now call “closure,” my experiences of grief have been anything but orderly. I remember moving through all five stages in the space of an hour, not in the order she delineated, and then repeating the process in a … Read more

NYCity Woman – Six Books to Read in August

  “The Widower’s Notebook by Jonathan Santlofer. How do men grieve? Santlofer, a noted crime writer, teacher and artist, answers with this intimate memoir written after the sudden death of his wife, Joy, after 40 years of marriage. He conjures her through exquisite drawings and an anguished but often humorous text that ranges from shock and disbelief to a growing closeness with his daughter and new adventures in dating.” NYCity Woman Roberta Hershenson Read more here

The Washington Post – Do men and women experience grief differently?

“Five years ago, Jonathan Santlofer’s wife, Joy, died unexpectedly following a routine outpatient procedure. In the days and months following her death, Santlofer kept a “widower’s notebook” — a collection of thoughts and drawings he polished and bound into a memoir of the same title. Reading Santlofer’s “The Widower’s Notebook” hit fairly close to home for me. I am also a widower. Heck, I even kept a “widower’s notebook” of my own for a while. “The Widower’s Notebook,” by Jonathan Santlofer (Penguin) Santlofer’s book is an affecting read and not entirely heavy, despite the subject matter. My wife, who died of cancer at 39, wrote a memoir, “The Bright Hour” about her own experiences with mortality, so I recognize the challenges of the dying-death-grieving genre. It is hard to present an untimely death without making it maudlin, or to convey the humor and absurdity of everyday life that persists even amid terminal illness and loss.” … Read more

Lit Hub Bookmarks: The Best Reviewed Books of the Week

“Santlofer’s book is an affecting read and not entirely heavy, despite the subject matter … Santlofer’s book, which shines most brightly when it focuses on his grief for his wife, is not a pedagogical tool and does not advance our understanding of grief in an appreciable way. It is the testimony of Jonathan Santlofer about the loss of his beloved wife … Viewed in that more limited lens, the book has perhaps less literary or cultural merit, but it still offers a moving portrait of one widower with a notebook.” The Washington Post John Duberstein Read More Here

Medium.com – The First Day of the Rest of My Life as a Widower

Medium.com has featured an excerpt of The Widower’s Notebook as a featured member story. The First Day of the Rest of My Life as a Widower. My wife’s mysterious death, and what came next. I start with the part where I am paralyzed, back pressed hard against the living room wall, shrinking into it but watching as if through a lens zooming in and out of the action, near then far, all of it taking place no more than five, six feet in front of me, firemen pushing the coffee table aside, books toppling, paramedics rolling my wife onto the floor, one tearing open her blouse and searching for a heartbeat, another pressing her chest up and down as a second team races in and a woman takes over, flips open a black bag and inserts a tube down my wife’s throat, everything happening in hyperspeed, while I stare at my wife’s face gone pale … Read more

Good Grief with Cheryl Jones – Podcast Interview with Jonathan Santlofer

On a day like any other, Jonathan Santlofer was suddenly dropped into the chaos of intense grief when his wife of 40 years suddenly died. His losses before this did not prepare him for his upended life. It did not prepare him for the insensitive and alienating things people said to him when he was too vulnerable to respond. It did not prepare him for the internal conflict of whether and how much to share about his intense mourning. He also had the sense that his inability to share his feelings and ask for help were deeply affected by the expectations he felt because he is a man. How did gender affect people’s expectations of what would happen next? How much of that was a conflict within his own heart? He found an anchor in writing down what he was experiencing. In his notebooks he was able to say it all, and to hear himself. … Read more