When Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl was kidnapped by terrorists in Pakistan in 2002, his very pregnant wife, Mariane, was left to try to manage the search effort. In this memoir of the month between Pearl's kidnapping and news of his death, she is unflinching, revealing every emotional detail with such honesty that to call the book heart-wrenching is to minimize its power. A journalist herself, Mariane is adept at detail and pacing, letting the events unfold as they happened, complete with their frustrating dead-ends and the tangle of Karachi's bureaucracy. She weaves in memories and thoughts about Danny, which give the book a keen poignancy. She describes how they first met at a party of her mother's, where he looked like "an elegant extra-terrestrial casting a delighted but somewhat perplexed glance at the earthly specimens." Later, after they were married and Mariane got pregnant, he would lean close to her growing belly and talk to the baby in a made-up language he was sure the baby would learn post-birth. After the kidnapping, as she searched his computer for clues, Mariane stumbled upon quirky lists he made, like "Things I Love About Mariane." Such insight into Pearl's personality make the tragedy of his death even sharper. As Mariane deals with his murder and faces the birth of their son alone, she acts with the same sincerity and grace that brought her through the ordeal of the kidnapping. It's not difficult to see why, on the list of things he loved about her, Pearl included: "Has incredible ability to see herself and others with clear perspective." (Sept. 30)
