Matters of Vital Interest: A Forty-Year Friendship with Leonard Cohen

This engaging memoir and chronicle of a long friendship offers generous glimpses of the private life of poet-singer/songwriter Leonard Cohen (1934–2016). Screenwriter and novelist Lerner (Pinkerton's Secret) met Cohen at a Buddhist retreat in 1977. Except for brief descriptions of albums in progress and disinterest from record companies, there's little about the artist's career. Cohen emerges as a spiritual seeker, a charming and loyal friend, and, above all, a family man. For many years the two shared a duplex in a seedy section of Los Angeles. They offered each other advice on work, family, and finding the right spiritual path. At times Cohen fades into the background as Lerner describes his own career and family. The last two chapters are a poignant account of Cohen's cancer and death; at the time, Lerner had brain surgery, and the two commiserated about treatments and declining health.