Review by Booklist Review
Intrepid journalist, novelist, essayist, and memoirist Joan Didion inspires passionate admiration. McDonnell considers Didion's "ongoing resonance with multiple generations" within the context of the writer's life and work, seeking to discern "what it was for her to be her, at different places and different times." Like her subject, McDonnell is a Californian and a versatile writer, also a professor, and she has long been immersed in Didion's writing, here examining myriad aspects of the creation of her works from Slouching toward Bethlehem to The Year of Magical Thinking. Visiting significant places and sharing gleanings from her conversations with Didion's relatives, friends, and associates, McDonnell offers a vitalized perspective on Didion's heritage as a fifth-generation Californian; early writing adventures; long marriage to writer John Gregory Dunne; relationship with their adopted daughter, Quintana Roo; beautiful homes in Southern California and Manhattan, celebrity, intense work ethic, health challenges, and the striking evolution of her radical, ardently refined oeuvre. Didion's emphatically skeptical interrogations of individuals, incidents, and situations, McDonnell avers, made her "one of the leading social and political commentators of her time." Shaped by intellectual rigor and artistic grace in chapters coalescing around totem objects that figured prominently in Didion's life and imagination (gold, snake, building, highball, morgue, and orchid), McDonnell's portrait is vibrant, fluent, sensitive, and clarifying.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Loyola Marymount University journalism professor McDonnell (Queens of Noise) delivers a disappointing ode to Joan Didion, recreating the author's life by meditating on "object that figured large in Didion's imaginary," including gold, snakes, hotels, and orchids. McDonnell begins with gold, discussing how Didion's teenage fascination with her '49er ancestors eventually transformed into a skepticism of the American imperial project they had participated in. The chapter on "man" delves into Didion's marriage to writer John Gregory Dunne, noting that he had a fierce temper and they fought often before reconciling during a stay at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel in the late 1960s. Unfortunately, McDonnell often focuses on the superficial aspects of Didion's life, dwelling on her fear of snakes, love of "fast cars as well as beautiful homes" (she drove a "yellow Corvette Stingray and lived in a Hollywood mansion"), and penchant for fine dining (she and Dunne "loved to eat out and had expensive tastes"). McDonnell praises her subject's prose--often to the point of hagiography--but the overall impression given of Didion is that she was more of a celebrity than a serious writer. Diverting and insubstantial, this only scratches the surface of Didion's enduring appeal. (Sept.)
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Review by Library Journal Review
This book is both a paean to the distinguished author Joan Didion and an account of McDonnell's (journalism, Loyola Marymount Univ.; Women Who Rock) encounters with Didion's texts and the legend. Didion looms large for McDonnell, who finds the ways in which her own writerly concerns line up with Didion's. The book portrays Didion as a "writer's writer," a literary craftsperson envied for fresh, effective presentations on every subject she undertook. Didion also spent considerable energy fashioning herself as a cultural icon. McDonnell conducted substantial immersive research for this literary project. For example, the chapter "Hotel" describes Didion's fondness for a specific hotel in Honolulu, and McDonnell stays briefly in the same hotel as a way of connecting with her literary hero. The author reveals more about herself as a fan than she provides new material about Didion's life, but readers can get those details in Tracy Daugherty's biography The Last Love Song. VERDICT McDonnell's starstruck approach to Didion enlivens other well-detailed accounts about her work and life. Best for literary biography sections.--Dorian Gossy
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
A biography of a significant American writer. "Most of us have a Joan Didion origin story: the article, or book, or photograph, or quote that first made us want to know more about this quiet oracle," writes journalist McDonnell, author of Mamarama and Women Who Rock. When the author was in college, she read Didion's essay "Some Dreamers of the Golden Dream," which asked what happened to the American dream, "the theme of much of [her] work." Thus was born a lifelong appreciation for one of America's most noteworthy stylists. McDonnell covers all the relevant biographical details: Didion's Sacramento childhood; her early years writing for New York magazines; and her family life, which included the tragedy of adopted daughter Quintana Roo, who died at age 39 in 2005 (the subject of Didion's Blue Nights). The author also offers personal reflections on Didion's importance to her life and career as well as interviews with people who knew her, including Calvin Trillin and Gay Talese and nephew Griffin Dunne. Admirably, McDonnell notes that Didion was a more complicated figure than many of her fans acknowledge. She grew up in "deep American conservatism," "never lost her distrust of big government," and voted for Barry Goldwater in 1964. She had a habit of "glamorizing consumption," which her early stint at Vogue underscored. Also, "when it comes to being an icon for women, Joan Didion can be deeply problematic," starting with her "mean-spirited attack on second-wave feminism," which "revealed her blindered privilege"--although she would moderate these opinions in later works. Overall, McDonnell offers a thoughtful assessment of Didion's importance but doesn't shy away from Didion's flaws--e.g., that she struggled with motherhood. During her childhood, Quintana Roo "made a list of her mother's favorite sayings: 'Brush your teeth, brush your hair, shush I'm working.' " An appreciative portrait of an iconic author. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
