On Top of the World: Cantor Fitzgerald, Howard Lutnick, & 9/11: A Story of Loss & Renewal

Author: Tom Barbash
List Price: $25.95
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ISBN: 0060510293
Publisher: HarperCollins (21 January, 2003)
Sales Rank: 91,165
Average Customer Rating: 4.31 out of 5

Customer Reviews

Rating: 4 out of 5
Great Read - Interesting, Powerful, Self-Serving / Promoting
This book is exceptionally powerful, reasonably well-written and blatantly self-serving. The good aspects overwhelm the bad by a wide margin.

Everyone has heard the story by now, but what makes this so powerful is the reality behind the story. First-hand accounts of the horror, and perhaps most importantly, the aftermath within the whole of the Cantor family are especially moving.

Even though this book was clearly written "through" Lutnick, his journey through the aftermath of 9/11 and the importance of his actions cannot be diminished. The ways in which the national news media sensationalized the tragedy for their own ratings is nauseating - although not surprising. Despite the fact that Connie Chung and O'Reilly no longer remain in the national arena of respected journalists, it is frustrating that they worked so hard to sabotage the healing process of the victim's families, and exploit the emotional fog which overcame them by instigating fear and helplessness.

Throughout the last few months of 2001, Lutnick does well to counter the national media's feeble attempts at honest story-telling, and shows in his actions what he had promised from the very beginning of the aftermath. He did in fact take care of these families, and in a way that goes well above and beyond what most would consider "reasonable."

A great read, impossible to put down. Just keep in mind that the author is great friends with Lutnick.

Rating: 4 out of 5
Great insight into a great loss
This well-written, easy-to-read book follows the ordeal of Cantor Fitzgerald, which lost more than 600 people in the World Trade Center attacks. The company was at the top of the first tower, right under Windows on the World and no one who was in the office at that time escaped. Fortunately, Howard Lutnick, who ran the company, went in late that day because it was his son's first day of kindergarten. He lost his only brother, his best friend and obviously a huge percentage of his employees in the attack. Lutnick, who before Sept. 11, had a barracuda-like reputation, was first exalted then vilified by the press (and the survivors of his murdered employees) after the attacks. (Largely because he stopped the employees' paychecks while families were still in denial.) The book follows him as he struggles to do the right thing -- which ultimately is keeping the company alive so that 25% of its profits can go to the survivors. A lot of people get fixated on the paycheck issue but it's obvious that if Lutnick had also died in this attack, the company would have gone under and there would have been no money at all. The book also describes many of the personalities at Cantor and the ways they interacted in a much more real way than the NYT Portraits of Grief. The full list of the dead is at the front of the book -- the fact that there are pages and pages of names from just this one company is horrifying. It's really a fine tribute to the strength of a bunch of spirited people, both living and deceased.

Rating: 5 out of 5
A moving tale about courage and hope
When September 11, 2001 began No one would know the evil that they were going to witness that day. By the end of that day company Cantor Fitzgeral would face the heavyest losses with nearly 700 employees gone. "On top of the world" by Tom Barbash, takes a inside look at the days,weeks,and months as CEO Howard Lutnick and remaining staff trys to move foward for the families of lost employees.
This is really good book that show each of us as human and our quest to help others.



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