Love Child: A Memoir of Family Lost and Found
3.5/5
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About this ebook
So began an extraordinary odyssey: from the magical Huston estate in Ireland, to the Long Island suburbs, to a hidden paradise in Mexico - and, at the side of her older sister, Anjelica, into the hilltop retreats of Jack Nicholson, Ryan O'Neal, and Marlon Brando. Allegra's is the penetrating gaze of an outsider never quite sure if she belongs in this rarefied world, and of a motherless child trying to make sense of her famous, fragmented family. Then, at the age of twelve, Allegra's precarious sense of self is shattered when she is, once more, introduced to her father - her real one, this time, the British aristocrat and historian John Julius Norwich.
At the heart of Love Child is Allegra's search through the unreliable certainties of memory for the widely adored mother she never knew - the ghost who shadowed her childhood and left her in a web of awkward and unwelcome truths. With clear-eyed tenderness, Allegra tells of how she forged bonds with both her famous fathers, transforming her mother's difficult legacy into a hard-won blessing.
Beautifully written and forensically honest, Love Child is a seductive insight into one of Hollywood's great dynasties, and the story of how, in a family that defied convention, one woman found her balance on the shifting sands of conflicting loyalties.
Allegra Huston
Allegra Huston has written screenplays, journalism and one previous book, Love Child: A Memoir of Family Lost and Found (2009). After an early career in publishing in the UK, including four years as editorial director of Weidenfeld & Nicolson, she joined the film company Pathé as development consultant. She wrote and produced the award-winning short film Good Luck, Mr. Gorski (2011), and is on the editorial staff of the international art and culture magazine Garage. She lives in Taos, New Mexico, with her fifteen-year-old son.
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Reviews for Love Child
11 ratings1 review
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5This is the memoir of Allegra Huston whose mother, Enrica Soma, was unhappily married to Movie Director John Huston. Allegra's mother died when she was 4 years old and she was sent to live with John Huston, who was mostly absent.
When John married Cici (wife #5), Allegra went to live with Cici and continued to live with her after Cici & John divorced. Eventually, Allegra moved in with her sister Anjelica. Shortly afterward, Cici arranged for Allegra to meet her biological father Sir John Justin Norwich, who up until their meeting Allegra had no idea existed.
Through Allegra's writing we get a glimpse of life in John & Anjelica Huston's households, not always a pretty picture, and what life was like for a "Child of Love", although John did take legal & financial responsibility for Allegra & his son Danny (who was his son by his mistress Zoe Sallis).
I almost put the book down as the first part of the book is a conglomerate of poorly written disjointed and sketchy memories. After all, how much does a 4 actually remember and how much is conjecture?
The latter part of the memoir is much more interesting than the beginning due to the fact that the memories contained therein are more accurate and written about people I can identify.