School bookkeeper opens up about McNair school shooting incident in new book

ATLANTA — Stunning revelations Monday from the school bookkeeper who talked an alleged gunman into surrendering after he opened fire at a school in DeKalb County.
 
Antoinette Tuff has now written a book about her experience.
 
In a one-on-one interview with Channel 2's Jovita Moore, she opened up about deeply personal issues, including why she tried to take her own life.
 
People have called Tuff a hero and now she's travelling around the country talking about how she stopped the alleged gunman from going on a rampage last August at Ronald E. McNair Discovery Learning Academy.
 
"How do you explain how you were able to control that situation?" Moore asked Tuff.
 
"Well, really I didn't know I was in control of it, because remember Michael was pacing the floor, telling me that we're all going to die, you know? That was going to be the end, and so in all reality, I didn't know if I was getting to him at all," Tuff said.  
 
In the book, Tuff shares details about her personal life, including a painful divorce and how it led her to want to take her life.
 
"When Terry left, I thought that was the end for me, and so all I knew was, 'OK, now this is the end, let me take it to the end,' but God knew that the end was not for me, but it was actually the beginning," Tuff said.
 
Tuff told Moore that just before the gunman entered the school, she received a devastating phone call from the bank.
 
"The call that I got was telling me I was no longer able to have my car and home and things that me and my family was used to," Tuff said.
 
 "You've written a book pretty much based on the faith that you have in God, talk about how that gets you through life and especially that day that Michael Hill walked into the school," Moore said to Tuff.
 
"That's all I know. I mean, I don't know how to live without God, I don't know how to breathe without him, that's all I know because when that AK-47 was in my face, it wasn't nobody there but God," Tuff said.

WSBTV