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Lady Blue Eyes

My Life with Frank Sinatra
by Barbara Sinatra
Lady Blue Eyes: My Life with Frank Sinatra. Crown Archetype. Mar. 2011. c.400p. photogs. index. ISBN 9780307382337. $24.99. MUSIC
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Barbara Sinatra, the fourth and final wife of Frank Sinatra, offers a heartfelt and moving memoir. She starts with her small-town Missouri youth; modeling career; stint as a Vegas showgirl; first marriage to a wealthy gambler, Zeppo Marx; and growing infatuation with her neighbor Frank Sinatra, whom she married in 1976 and lived with until his death in 1998. Relating her interactions at countless dinner parties, tennis matches, and golf outings, the author captures the personalities of such insiders as Gregory Peck, Spiro Agnew, Dean Martin, John F. Kennedy, and Ronald Reagan. She casts Frank as a loving, volatile, generous, and obsessive creative genius who surrounded himself with a coterie of understanding and compliant friends to shield him from the constant pressures of his iconic status.
VERDICT Though shedding little new light on Frank Sinatra musically, this memoir ably captures the character of the singer and provides an enjoyable romp through pop culture of the 1950s–80s. It complements the autobiographies of Sinatra's daughters, Nancy (Frank Sinatra, My Father, o.p.) and Tina (My Father's Daughter).
Reviewed by Dave Szatmary. Univ. of Washington, Seattle , Nov 15, 2010
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