Saturday Night Widows: The Adventures of Six Friends Remaking Their Lives

by Becky Aikman

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Biography & Autobiography. Sociology. Nonfiction. HTML:Six marriages, six heartbreaks, one shared beginning. In her forties �?? a widow, too young, too modern to accept the role �?? Becky Aikman struggled to make sense of her place in an altered world. In this transcendent and infectiously wise memoir, she explores surprising new discoveries about how people experience grief and transcend loss and, following her own remarriage, forms a group with five other young widows to test these unconventional ideas. Together, these friends summon the humor, resilience, and striving spirit essential for anyone overcoming adversity. Meet the Saturday Night Widows: ringleader Becky, an unsentimental journalist who lost her husband to cancer; Tara, a polished mother of two, whose husband died in the throes of alcoholism after she filed for divorce; Denise, a widow of just five months, now struggling to get by; Marcia, a hard-driving corporate lawyer; Dawn, an alluring self-made entrepreneur whose husband was killed in a sporting accident, leaving two small children behind; and Lesley, a housewife who returned home one day to find that her husband had committed suicide. The women meet once a month, and over the course of a year, they strike out on ever more far-flung adventures, learning to live past the worst thing they thought could happen. They share emotional peaks and valleys �?? dating, parenting, moving, finding meaningful work, and reinventing themselves �?? while turning traditional thinking about loss and recovery upside down. Through it all runs the story of Aikman's own journey through grief and her love affair with a man who tempts her to marry again. In a transporting story of what friends can achieve when they hold each other up, Saturday Night Widows is a rare book that will make you laugh, think, and remind yourself that despite the utter unpredictability and occasional tragedy of life, it is also precious, fragile, and often more joyous than we recognize. Look for Becky's new book, Off The Cliff: How the Making of Thelma & Louise Drove Hollywood to the Edge… (more)

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A Recommended Read. Becky Aikman has written a captivating tale that will resonate with anyone who has ever lost a loved one or knows someone who has. Saturday Night Widows is not a book about loss but a moving story of friendship. It is a beautiful novel about surviving devastating losses, moving past that heartache and embracing the future. To read my review in its entirety, please click HERE. (

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kbranfield | Feb 3, 2020 |

The author was widowed young and found herself not fitting it with the traditional sort of widows group. She got tired of being handed information about the stages of grief and decided to branch out and form her own kind of support group. She wanted the focus of the group to be on living and trying new experiences. So she started asking around and meeting with potential members. That leads to the first meeting of the "Saturday Night Widows" - a meeting where she is fraught with anxiety about how the whole project is going to go. However after some initial awkwardness, the group begins to become just what she had believed it would be - a place for women to shed their "widow's weeds" and encourage one another as they face life solo. This book is a chronicle of their first year, and I felt truly privileged to hear the remarkable stories of these women and how they tackled overcoming the enormous losses in their lives. I felt like I learned a bit about life and grieving from their experiences, as I laughed, cried, and ruminated over what it means to take the best pieces of the past forward into the future. I highly recommend this book to anyone, and most especially those who have struggled with a great loss. (

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debs4jc | Jan 26, 2017 |

I had missed the word 'memoir' in the description, and so was totally taken aback & had to rethink about what I was getting into, after I read the first few pages and realized that it was non-fiction.

So, I appreciated, mostly, the science. I was actually surprised to learn that some people think the Kubler-Ross 5 stages had to do with grieving - I learned them as what they were meant to be refections of, the most likely stages that one who is dying tends to go through.

I hope to see another book on the theme - it's about time that some real science is done to help widows and widowers. Meanwhile, this felt pretty authentic to the experience many young widows must go through.

Of course, I can't identify with having money to go to the Galapagos and to Morocco in the same decade, or to fretting so much about what other people think, or even, now that I'm menopausal, to wanting so badly to go to bed with someone. (

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Cheryl_in_CC_NV | Jun 6, 2016 |

This may not seem like beach reading, but I am almost euphoric about finding this book -- I keep having little Eureka! moments, like "Yes! I felt exactly the same way!" and "Oh my gosh, me TOO!"

And now I look like a lobster from the back, because I was so busy reading that I forgot to turn over. (

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BraveNewBks | Mar 10, 2016 |

I liked the concept a lot, but I was very aware of how Sex and the City these women were. You can't help wondering how the project would have gone down among people who don't have summer homes and glamorous Manhattan brownstones and "Paris was one of our favorite places" lifestyles. The book feels very summarized, too, which kept me on the outside; while I loved the idea of these six women bonding and growing together, I didn't feel connected to them myself. I was a well-removed observer. I actually think film would have been a better medium for this story, and I'll be interested to see if they ever do make a movie out of it.

mirikayla | Feb 8, 2016 |

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Biography & Autobiography. Sociology. Nonfiction. HTML:Six marriages, six heartbreaks, one shared beginning.

   In her forties �?? a widow, too young, too modern to accept the role �?? Becky Aikman struggled to make sense of her place in an altered world. In this transcendent and infectiously wise memoir, she explores surprising new discoveries about how people experience grief and transcend loss and, following her own remarriage, forms a group with five other young widows to test these unconventional ideas. Together, these friends summon the humor, resilience, and striving spirit essential for anyone overcoming adversity.

   Meet the Saturday Night Widows: ringleader Becky, an unsentimental journalist who lost her husband to cancer; Tara, a polished mother of two, whose husband died in the throes of alcoholism after she filed for divorce; Denise, a widow of just five months, now struggling to get by; Marcia, a hard-driving corporate lawyer; Dawn, an alluring self-made entrepreneur whose husband was killed in a sporting accident, leaving two small children behind; and Lesley, a housewife who returned home one day to find that her husband had committed suicide.

   The women meet once a month, and over the course of a year, they strike out on ever more far-flung adventures, learning to live past the worst thing they thought could happen. They share emotional peaks and valleys �?? dating, parenting, moving, finding meaningful work, and reinventing themselves �?? while turning traditional thinking about loss and recovery upside down. Through it all runs the story of Aikman's own journey through grief and her love affair with a man who tempts her to marry again. In a transporting story of what friends can achieve when they hold each other up, Saturday Night Widows is a rare book that will make you laugh, think, and remind yourself that despite the utter unpredictability and occasional tragedy of life, it is also precious, fragile, and often more joyous than we recognize.

Look for Becky's new book, Off The Cliff: How the Making of Thelma & Louise Drove Hollywood to the Edge

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