Cher: The Memoir, Part One
Ratings4
Average rating4.1
The extraordinary life of Cher can be told by only one person ... Cher herself. After more than seventy years of fighting to live her life on her own terms, Cher finally reveals her true story in intimate detail, in a two-part memoir. Her remarkable career is unique and unparalleled. The only woman to top Billboard charts in seven consecutive decades, she is the winner of an Academy Award, an Emmy, a Grammy and a Cannes Film Festival Award, and an inductee to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame who has been lauded by the Kennedy Center. She is a longtime activist and philanthropist. As a dyslexic child who dreamed of becoming famous, Cher was raised in often-chaotic circumstances, surrounded by singers, actors and a mother who inspired her in spite of their difficult relationship. With her trademark honesty and humour, Cher: The Memoir traces how this diamond in the rough succeeded with no plan and little confidence to become the trailblazing superstar the world has been unable to ignore for more than half a century. Cher: The Memoir, Part One follows her extraordinary beginnings through childhood to meeting and marrying Sonny Bono – and reveals the highly complicated relationship that made them world-famous, but eventually drove them apart. Cher: The Memoir reveals the daughter, the sister, the wife, the lover, the mother and the superstar. It is a life too immense for only one book.
Tags
Reviews
Popular Reviews
Reviews with the most likes.
Two-thirds of a great memoir. I couldn't put the book down during the chapters that cover Cher's dreadful childhood and her inexplicable relationship with Sonny Bono (he lied, cheated, and stole from her for decades, somehow convincing her that she was lucky to have him). The last few chapters suffer from too much name dropping and too many descriptions of her unique Bob Mackie-designed dresses, although she does spill some delicious tea about former lovers Greg Allman, David Geffen, and Gene Simmons. Ends abruptly in 1980 when Francis Ford Coppola encourages her to pursue her acting dreams. Throughout it all, Cher's voice is matter of fact, devoid of self-pity or sentimentality, except when she's talking about her kids.
We're still decades away from “do you belieeeeve in life after love?” so the second part of this diva's memoir should be equally compelling.
It's always hard to rate someone's life story, so the rating I've given pertains mostly to the writing itself. It was immediately obvious that the book is, like almost all celebrity memoirs, ghostwritten. There is nothing inherently offputting about the fact itself, but a lot of the time, the writing felt ungenuine, detached from the emotional depth that Cher experienced in some of the most pivotal moments of her early career.
Additionally, I felt there were parts with maybe a bit too much self congratulatory narration, and some of the classic 'not like other girls'-esque thoughts. Maybe the memoir genre is always like this, I don't read enough of them to know. Writing a whole book about oneself is probably always going to cast the writer in the role of the egotist. And Cher did achieve a lot.
The story itself is inspiring, and the magnitude of the achievement comes across despite the writing. In particular, I really love the image of Cher at the awards show, wearing the midriff revealing outfit with a fur coat, Sonny looking at her in rapt admiration. That speaks volumes of her nonconformist persona much better than a lot of the writing does.
