Description:
On December 26 2019 Amy Gannon and her 13-year-old daughter Jocelyn were killed on a helicopter tour on the Na Pali Coast in Hawaii. The accident changed the future not only of Amy's husband Mike and son Aaron but also extinguished the rising star of a beloved activist entrepreneur and friend.
The loss was overwhelming but Mike was determined not to let his wife's legacy fade. Mike set out to compile a thorough biography of Amy's life with the goal of helping Aaron know his mother as well as possible. Over a year and a half writer and editor Susanna Daniel interviewed more than 45 of Amy's friends family and colleagues from her junior high homecoming date to the interns who worked at her nonprofit from her parents and closest friends to students in her classes and colleagues who were profoundly influenced by her wisdom support and generous spirit.
Amy's life story took her from a modest and challenging childhood in Greenville Ohio to American University to a career deeply entwined with social justice and empowering women. She was fiercely loyal to her friends tirelessly committed to ending inequity and the patriarchy and deeply in love with her family. There is no question that Amy stamped the world indelibly with her passion wit and warmth and that the world is worse off without her in it.
Brief description: Susanna Daniel is the author of Stiltsville, which won the PEN/Bingham prize for best debut, and Sea Creatures, a Target Book Club Pick. She's the co-founder of the Madison Writers' Studio, www.madisonwriters.com, a hybrid creative writing workshop for writers of fiction and creative nonfiction, and lives in Madison, Wisconsin, with her two sons and two dogs. Her third novel Battersea Road is forthcoming.
Review Quotes:
"What began as a pure-hearted effort for a grieving son becomes, in Susanna Daniel's deft hands, a remarkable gift to everyone who
knew (or thought they knew) Amy Gannon. Richly resourced, gutsy, and heartbreakingly intimate, Daniels brings Gannon's words and legacy to life."
Maggie Ginsberg, author of Still True
"We often joked about how we'd be friends forever, as old women, rocking in chairs on each other's porches, laughing together about our life in business and as two women-one black and one white-doing our parts to bridge gaps. But the Universe, as Amy called it, had different plans. While nothing will ever replace her mentoring, gift for strategy, generous heart, and fight for women, I am thankful that her story lives on."
Sagashus T. Levingston, founder Infamous Mothers and author of Covet