What Remains: A Memoir of Fate, Friendship, and Love [Hardcover]

Carole Radziwill (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 26, 2005

"What Remains" begins with loss and returns to loss. A small plane plunges into the ocean, carrying John Kennedy and Carolyn, Carole's cousins-in-law and closest friends. Three weeks later Carole's husband, Anthony, nephew of the late President John F. Kennedy, died. He was diagnosed with cancer shortly before their wedding and his illness became the focal point of their five-year marriage. The summer of the plane crash, the four friends were meant to be cherishing Anthony's last days. Instead, Carole and Anthony mourned John and Carolyn, even as Carole planned her husband's memorial. This is a candid, intimate and compelling story of love, loss and, ultimately, resilience.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Here's a very sad story: a middle-class girl is working as a reporter at ABC, where she meets a handsome man from a famous family. They court, marry and become best friends with the husband's first cousin and his new wife. Abruptly, the reporter's husband is diagnosed with cancer. He dies, but not before the cousin and his wife (and her sister) die, too, in a senseless plane crash. This would be a heartbreaking story even if it weren't about Anthony Radziwill, nephew of Jackie Kennedy Onassis, and about his and Carole's friendship with John and Carolyn Bessette Kennedy. But because its publisher (and, presumably, the author) have decided not to market it as a "Kennedy book" but "a memoir of fate, friendship and love," it begs consideration on its literary merits. So here goes: Radziwill is a serviceable, if sentimental, writer. She is brave, especially when she describes how cancer became the third party in her marriage, and how she briefly flirted with infidelity. She also knows how to convey the essence of a person with small scenes and quotes (JFK Jr. holding his dying friend's hand and softly singing a song from their childhood; director Mike Nichols not calling but just coming to the hospital and handing out sandwiches to the nurses). Still, perhaps in Radziwill's effort to further the myth of its non-Kennedyness, much of this already short book feels padded—with scenes from the author's childhood and medical details about Anthony's treatment. Otherwise, much of Radziwill's writing approaches melodrama, particularly when she recounts that July 1999 night when the plane crashed. At one point, Radziwill scoffs at the "tragedy whores" who luxuriate in Kennedy trauma, and yet she seems to have been unable to resist contributing some crumbs to their feeding frenzy.
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Review

"A moving testimony to the tenuous nature of love and life." -- USA Today

"A riveting and heartbreaking journey beyond the fairy tale, told with the compassion of a friend and wife." -- Jeannette Walls, author of

"A stunning memoir of love and loss" -- O Magazine

"Carole Radziwill, a wonderful writer . . . gets at the essence of what matters - friendship, compassion, destiny." -- Oprah Winfrey, O Magazine

"One of the best memoirs . . . a small masterpiece . . . devestating and beautifully written." -- NY Post

"Powerfully affecting . . . a highly compelling read." -- Vogue

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 264 pages
• Publisher: Scribner (September 26, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0739458736
• ISBN-13: 978-0743276948
• ASIN: 0743276949
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (182 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #320,079 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

108 of 124 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fortune Gives Us Nothing Which We Can Really Own, September 30, 2005

By 

prisrob "pris," (New England USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

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This review is from: What Remains: A Memoir of Fate, Friendship, and Love (Hardcover)

4.5 stars
"Orson Wells said to Gore Vidal once, in an interview about a movie he was writing, 'if you want a happy ending, it depends on where you stop your story'". Carole Radziwell begins her book with this quote and understands this all too well. Her book is such a story about love and loss and recovery.

Carole DiFalco lived and grew up in Suffern, New York, 40 odd miles from New York City, but it was a lifetime away in reality. She had a proper childhood and grew up in a close knit family; they all loved to cook and loved their grandmother, the center of the family. At the age of 19, Carole realized she needed to move on with her life and took a job at "ABC News". This job led her to many adventures in Cambodia, Tel Aviv, and Saigon. As she worked her way up the ladder to Assistant Producer, she felt more comfortable with herself and her life. She was sent to California to work on the Mendoza murder trials ,and there she met the love of her life, Anthony Radziwell. Anthony also worked for ABC, and they started a romance that built slowly over a couple of years. At last they realized they were in love and Anthony proposed.

Moving into the whirl of the Radziwell family was no small feat. This is a large family with close connections to everything and everybody. Carole's mother-in-law, Lee Radziwell, was the sister of Jackie Kennedy, and was once married to a Polish Prince. Anthony's closest and best friend was John Kennedy Jr., and his girlfriend and then wife, Carolyn, became Carole's closest friend. Carole and Carolyn felt a kinship, outsiders in this famous family, and slowly they began to find a place in the family. There are several references to the difficulty of living within the social whirl for both Carole and Carolyn. The center of Carole's universe, Anthony finds a large "lump" on his abdomen several months before they were married. This bump turns out to be a sarcoma, a cancer. There are many surgeries and over the five years of their marriage, much of it is spent in hospitals, clinics and/or gathering information about the new and next therapies. Carole develops the role of organizer, and it is she who leads the troops to win over the cancer. Anthony is the unwilling participant, and the rest of the family supports them both but play parts in the periphery. Carolyn Kennedy becomes the friend Carole Radziwell needs. She is there to offer comfort and solace and to bring a little life into the depressive life of those who have or care for someone with metastasic cancer. We see the love that John Jr and Carolyn have for each other.

Of course we all know the ending. The tragic airplane crash of Carolyn, her sister,Lauren, and John Kennedy, and then the death of Anthony two weeks later. The time of mourning and the slow recovery are explored. Carole Radziwell relays a little of the life of the Kennedy's, but not in a "gossipy" manner, but that of the emotional roller coaster that entails her life. Such an inspiring story, sure to hit the chord of anyone who has gone through the hard times in life. She gives us a first hand account of the loves and losses we all have in our life. She has a gift of a true writer and has shown us her deep insights.

"Fortune gives us nothing which we can really own". Seneca

Highly recommended. prisrob

49 of 55 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Amazing, November 16, 2005

By 

Nancy Siefken "Elizabeth's Sister" (Austin Texas) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: What Remains: A Memoir of Fate, Friendship, and Love (Hardcover)

I bought this book in an airport because of the cover. The cover photo is one I have in my bedroom. I was in a huge hurry to get a book for the plane ride and I didn't notice the author's name particularly.

I read the entire book on that plane ride and it was an out of body experience for me because I have just recently finished helping my sister die. The book reviewer who treated it as though it were a "Kennedy" book disguised as a memoir and alluded that she was somehow capitalizing on a famous name to sell a book obviously isn't in this club that I now live in. Grief is a horrific world. It's the story of your life and I think she had to tell it to survive.

First of all, it's well written (no joke, the woman is a journalist---they practice the craft daily). This reviewer claims the book is "padded" with her childhood experiences. Excuse me, it's a memoir ! ! ! Childhood MEMORIES are not padding in a MEMOIR. The fact that her marriage -- to a person who is happens to be the maternal cousin of John Kennedy---dominates the book is because that was the biggest "story" in her life. So, naturally, a good writer of a MEMOIR will emphasize the biggest story of their life. And, it's not the biggest story of her life because he had a famous name. It's the biggest story of her life because her husband was handed a death sentence and she had to help him live knowing he was going to die.

This is NOT a "Kennedy" book (didn't know that was a category), it's a memoir that does a most excellent job of describing being in the inner circle of a young person who has been handed a death sentence. I know because I have lived it.

For this author it was her husband. For me, it was my younger sister who got her death sentence at 36. She was single and I "picked my role in the beginning" (a line from the book), I was going to manage it and fix it. Big sister that likes to research and take notes.

This book was a tremendous help to me as I was able to recognize some things and understand some of the things that happened to me. Helping someone die is an honor and it is a trauma and it was the biggest thing that has ever happened to me. My life will be forever defined by it and if I ever have occasion to write a memoir that experience would overshadow marriage, childbirth, career (or being married to someone famous which I'm not and won't but you get my point).

The fact that she was introduced to grief a few weeks before her husband dies (when she loses her best friend Carolyn Bissette Kennedy) is an unfathomable concept to me. I don't know how she survived that.

At any rate, those who are fascinated by the Kennedys will like it because you certainly get a great feel for John and Carolyn. I cried thoughout all Carolyn stories because she sounds so much like my sister who also had a "secret agent voice" calling me all the time "don't tell Mom and Dad, but I'm back in the country..."

My sister was also 5'11, but was referred to as a "six foot blonde". Charming and loving and fluttery long hands...

Anyone who reads this will adore Carolyn Bissette Kennedy.

But what I can't forgive the reviewer for is this bizarre reference to the cancer stuff (you know the pesky medical details that got in the way of voyuering on Kennedys) PLEASE.
I promise if I ever write a memoir there will be bone scan results verbatim.

In one passage the author describes the emotion she feels when a moron who doesn't notice they need assistance, hands her the hotel key and gives her directions to her room down a long, long hallway. Her husband is standing there and that long walk is going to be very painful, but he looks at her with that look that silently pleads for you not to embarrass him. "Don't make a scene, don't demand a closer room or a wheelchair".

You see, her husband was young and handsome and never got comfortable with being old and dying. Similarly, my sister was young and beautiful. She was used to stopping traffic, she certainly didn't like dying.

The author later talks about her resuce fantasies where she goes back and rescues him from that hallway walk that they took.

I have a rescue fantasy about a tarmac in Atlanta and I could see the wheelchairs parked way over by the terminal. It had taken her so long to descend the stairs to the tarmac and she knew I was loaded for bear and ready to bark orders and have someone trot one over to us. Her eyes said "don't do it"...I wish I could go back in time and rescue her from that long walk to the terminal.

So, obviously I identified with the book, but you don't have to have lived that to love this book. It's not a "Kennedy" book and it's not a "cancer" book. If anything it's a "grief" book or a "fate" book. Oh wait a minute, the author put it on the cover. It's a book about fate, friendship and love.

31 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gorgeous writing, heartbreaking story, September 27, 2005

By 

Pamela Keogh "Author" (New York, NY) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: What Remains: A Memoir of Fate, Friendship, and Love (Hardcover)

I live in NYC and bought (and read) this book the first day it came out. Of course, anyone with access to People magazine knows the rough outline of Ms. Radziwill's story, but what she does -- through her evocative memories -- is share a privileged glimpse of a couragous and ultimately sorrowful story. While it is said that some of the Kennedys are unhappy with her memoir, I completely disagree -- Ms. Radziwill's story of her love for her husband and the life they shared, and her friends John and Carolyn Kennedy, is her own. Because if one does not own their own story, what do they have?

Having said that, I am in awe of Ms. Radziwill's strength, and her courage. "What Remains" is a remarkable story of love and loss in the face of a world that will sometimes break your heart.

Finally, Ms. Radziwill is a hell of a writer. This book will be a classic. I hope she continues -- if I could, I would give the book ten stars.