Book description
A groundbreaking and irresistible biography of three of
America's most important musical artists -- Carole King, Joni
Mitchell, and Carly Simon -- charts their lives as women at a
magical moment in time.
Carole King, Joni Mitchell, and Carly Simon remain among the most
enduring and important women in popular music. Each woman is distinct.
Carole King is the product of outer-borough, middle-class New York
City; Joni Mitchell is a granddaughter of Canadian farmers; and Carly
Simon is a child of the Manhattan intellectual upper crust. They
collectively represent, in their lives and their songs, a great swath
of American girls who came of age in the late 1960s. Their stories
trace the arc of the now mythic sixties generation -- female version
-- but in a bracingly specific and deeply recalled way, far from
cliché. The history of the women of that generation has never been
written -- until now, through their resonant lives and emblematic
songs.
Filled with the voices of many dozens of these women's intimates,
who are speaking in these pages for the first time, this alternating
biography reads like a novel -- except it's all true, and the heroines
are famous and beloved. Sheila Weller captures the character of each
woman and gives a balanced portrayal enriched by a wealth of new
information.
Girls Like Us is an epic treatment of midcentury women who
dared to break tradition and become what none had been before them --
confessors in song, rock superstars, and adventurers of heart and
soul.
"Both scholarly and dishy. A superb journalist,
Weller has managed to uncover a trove of unreported facts on her
subjects." -- People **** (Pick of the Week)
Sheila Weller is a New York Times
bestselling author and award-winning magazine journalist. She is the
author of five previous books, most recently her 2003 family memoir,
Dancing at Ciro's, which The Washington Post called
"a substantial contribution to American social history." She
is the senior contributing editor at Glamour, a contributor to
Vanity Fair, and a former contributing editor of New
York. To learn more, visit www. girlslikeusthebook. com.
