In 1998, twenty-four-year-old Bryan Charles came to New York, following the well-trodden path of many before him—pursuing the life of a writer in the storied city far from his Midwestern roots. And like so many of his predecessors, his journey took him into squalid apartments and mind-numbing temp jobs, fleeting romances and dwindling finances, self-doubt and homesickness. He chronicles these experiences with equal parts witty observation and unguarded honesty, reflecting on the life of a solitary soul in a teeming metropolis, struggling to make a living . . . and struggling harder to make it as a writer.

His life takes a turn for the better when he lands in a lucrative job that pays the bills, builds his bank account, and buys him a chance to chase his dream—all from the seventieth floor of the World Trade Center. But the next turn his life takes, and which takes the lives of thousands of others, is a destiny-altering nightmare . . . and a call to action that can't be ignored.

Library Journal (starred review)

“This is the book I can’t forget…Full of insightful, transcendent regular-guy moments and bad decisions, it didn’t make me like the author, but it knocked me on my ass.”

Bookforum

“[A] potent, touching, slow burn of a memoir . . . Charles has in his back pocket one of the world's most apocalyptic recent events to tie up his story lines, and it is to the book's credit that, despite it being almost adecade since September 11, the events are described with both jarring emotional effect and remarkable constraint . . . From the first loud boom and floor tremble, it's hard to stop reading.”

New York Observer

“Mr. Charles . . . writes in a frighteningly spare voice . . . [His] narrative style, journalistic and declarative, gives every scene the weight of a reported event.”

Publishers Weekly

“Much-needed . . . a gripping account told in the muted style of a writer with true authority.”

Booklist

“With a spare style, subtle humor, and huge dollops of emotional angst, Charles puts a modern spin on the urban memoir.”

The Rumpus

“The juxtaposition of the most mundane of details with the hugeness of New York City and the incomprehensibility of a terrorist attack manages to show us something not just about September 11 but about our 21st-century lives: how easy it is to lose our way as we confront the innumerable roads that stretch before us.”

Volume 1 Brooklyn

“[Charles’s] account of working for Morgan Stanley plays out like a comedy of errors—at least until the location of said workplace, on the seventieth floor of the World Trade Center, turns that workplace narrative into something very different.”

[tk] reviews

“[A] most extraordinarily unprecedented experience . . . Charles holds off on giving us a neat and tidy resolution, a quick essay or sound bite on ‘What 9/11 Meant to Me’ . . . he knows how to lay a foundation for one hell of a sucker punch.”