What Remains: A Memoir of Fate, Friendship, and Love

Carole Radziwill

Oct 2005 · Sold by Simon and Schuster

About this ebook

A stunning, tragic memoir about John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife Carolyn Bessette, and his cousin Anthony Radziwill, by Radziwill’s widow.

What Remains is a vivid and haunting memoir about a girl from a working-class town who becomes an award-winning television producer and marries a prince, Anthony Radziwill. Carole grew up in a small suburb with a large, eccentric cast of characters. At nineteen, she struck out for New York City to find a different life. Her career at ABC News led her to the refugee camps of Cambodia, to a bunker in Tel Aviv, and to the scene of the Menendez murders. Her marriage led her into the old world of European nobility and the newer world of American aristocracy.

What Remains begins with loss and returns to loss. A small plane plunges into the ocean carrying John F. Kennedy Jr., Anthony’s cousin, and Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, Carole’s closest friend. Three weeks later Anthony dies of cancer. With unflinching honesty and a journalist’s keen eye, Carole Radziwill explores the enduring ties of family, the complexities of marriage, the importance of friendship, and the challenges of self-invention. Beautifully written, What Remains “gets at the essence of what matters,” wrote Oprah Winfrey. “Friendship, compassion, destiny.”

Ratings and reviews

beautifully written. told frm the heart. a live and let live story. She dosent realize how blessed she was to live with individuals who were brightly shinning stars here on Earth, who so many people looked up to, obsessed over, longing to touch their magic....shes the story teller. the story teller always lives. So that she can tell the story of these charmed individuals...Life happened and they died tragically in a plane crash over the ocean and the other dies of cancer. and she is left behind. Thank you to the Author for finally telling their story. This was written frm her heart.

Thois book was one that I could not put down. I just went to a similar situation in January and we are still mourning. I could not believe the similarity of what her and Anthony's life had become month after month. I remeber the diagnosis of liver cancer we got and the immediate response to surgery and just remove it all. Then we will get on with life. Then 8 months later same thing. Every three months the sonogram tto make sure it hadn't grown larger or metastasized, god forbid. Then weekly visits on Saturday mornings for about three months getting stomach drained of fluid that had leaked from her , liver like an overloaded sponge. Losing anywhere from 4 to 9 lbs a week. In the last couple of days her eyes were sunk in and so skinny. She didn't move for two days. She couldn't walk without or help.

This book touchingly takes the reader through the myriad of emotions; of not only dealing with terminal illness, but of building a life. A life full of complicated, deep and lasting relationships.

About the author

Carole Radziwill worked as an award-winning journalist with ABC News for fifteen years. She is the author of the New York Times bestseller What Remains, the novel A Widow's Guide to Sex and Dating, and she stars on the Bravo reality show The Real Housewives of New York.