Janet Gotkin, a former New Yorker living in Santa Fe, New Mexico, describes herself as “a white, Jewish, badass feminist and abortion rights advocate and a New York Mets fan”.
Her recent book: The Tattooed Widow is a powerful memoir, including her experiences from childhood abuse to adventures with her husband throughout Europe. Now over 80 years old, recollecting the good and bad elements which shaped her life and beliefs offer significant emotional and observational insights because she believes that “our stories matter and sharing our stories validates our experiences and gives us power.”
In addition to The Tattooed Widow, she is the co-author with her husband Paul of the memoir Too Much Anger, Too Many Tears: A Personal Triumph Over Psychiatry, first published in 1975 by Quadrangle Books and reissued in 1992 by HarperPerennial.
She holds a Master’s degree in Library and Information Science and was a public librarian and the owner of a research company in New York. She has been active in protecting abortion rights since the early 1970’s, serving as an abortion clinic escort, a member of New York NARAL, and a member of the Westchester County Chapter of the National Organization for Women and Santa Fe NOW. She is the author of an unpublished novel with a strong underpinning of magic realism called The Do-Over about an eighty-year old woman who slips into a gopher hole at the Santa Fe Rodeo grounds, breaking her tibia and reporting that she has spoken to her long-dead husband, Fred, who is alive and thriving in an alternative universe.
Notes from Janet Gotkin: The overturn of Roe v. Wade in 2022 unleashed pent-up misogyny across the country as state after state passed punitive, cruel abortion bans and women began to die because they were denied pregnancy care. New Mexico had repealed its pre-Roe abortion ban in 2021 (I worked on that repeal), but the New Mexico Choice Coalition had disbanded, leaving non-profits to organize and fundraise individually. Our commitment at Santa Fe NOW has not changed: we still work, through lobbying and partnerships, to ensure that New Mexico remains a safe place for women seeking abortion care. The state’s abortion fund capacity has increased and we now have providers in multiple locations.
The scope of our work has widened to include efforts to protect trans youth, expand healthcare, pass common sense gun violence protection laws, and eliminate racism. I am donating one
dollar from the sale of each copy of The Tattooed Widow to a New Mexico abortion fund. Each time I think I am too old for activism and public demonstrations, some new atrocity is committed and I end up in the streets, along with thousands of Santa Feans. In the last year and a half, I attended three NO KINGS rallies and a training on how to protect neighbors if ICE appears.
I continue to hold firm in my belief that we all deserve to live our lives without being bullied, shamed, or belittled; to define ourselves as we wish, to wear our age and our widowhood and our survivorship – from childhood sexual abuse, psychiatric abuse, or the scourges of poverty, racism, marginalization, or gender-based violence – in whatever way feels right and safe. And I believe, as I always have, that we own our stories and we gain power by sharing them.
I hope you have gained power or confidence or validation – or just a few hours of pleasure – from reading The Tattooed Widow. It is my honor to share my story with you.
Notice: One dollar from the sale of each copy of The Tattooed Widow will go to the a New Mexico Abortion Fund.
The Tattooed Widow is available in print through local bookstores, or to purchase in ebook or print form online click here.
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Comments from Reviewers of The Tattooed Widow
“Widowhood is as varied as the unions that precede it. After the death of her husband who was her life-partner and soulmate, Janet Gotkin defies the current meme about widowhood that grief will end and widows should get on with their lives, preferably with gratitude and quiet acquiescence. Instead, she follows her heart into uncharted territory to create a unique path through the land of grief-without-end. Her task holds meaning for anyone who has been blessed by love and its inevitable loss.”
Glenna-Halvorson Boyd, author of Dancing in Limbo: Making Sense of Life After Cancer and co-author of We Choose To: A Memoir of Providing Abortion Care Before, During, and After Roe.
“Janet Gotkin, co-author with her husband Paul of the groundbreaking book Too Much Anger, Too Many Tears: A Personal Triumph Over Psychiatry, is a fearless truthteller and a consummate storyteller. The Tattooed Widow, her extraordinary memoir, is a story about finding love and then losing it after half a century; about grief, trauma, and the challenges of aging and living alone. Janet’s insight and clarity, and her wonderful ability to describe places, people, and emotions make this a profoundly moving statement about love, loss, transformation, and courage.”
Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson Author of thirty-one books, including The Assault on Truth: Freud’s Suppression of the Seduction Theory and When Elephants Weep: Emotional Lives of Animals.
“The Tattooed Widow is a resonant memoir that examines grief, selfhood, trauma, and the struggle to redefine one’s identity after loss… The memoir is part homage to the author’s late husband; part story of her widowhood; partly a story of the extreme abuse she experienced as a child; and part abortion activism story… Gotkin–a survivor of sexual abuse, former mental hospital patient, wife, mother, widow, and women’s rights advocate–delivers her story with honesty and chutzpah.”
The BookLife Prize, Critic’s Report
“In her poignant memoir, Janet Gotkin reminds us that abortion is woven into family life just as certainly as birth and death, love and loss.”
Joan Lamunyon Sanford Former Executive Director of the New Mexico Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, now called Faith Roots Reproductive Action.
The Tattooed Widow©2026 Janet Gotkin
Printed in the United State of America
ISBN #979-8-234-08191-9
Formatted by RMK Publication, LLC
The Tattooed Widow is available in print through local bookstores, or to purchase in ebook or print form online click here.