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It Seemed Important at the Time: A Romance Memoir
By Gloria Vanderbilt ( Simon & Schuster )
Release Date: 2004-09-28
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Product Description
An elegant, witty, frank, touching, and deeply personal account of the loves both great and fleeting in the life of one of America's most celebrated and fabled women.

Born to great wealth yet kept a virtual prisoner by the custody battle that raged between her proper aunt and her self-absorbed, beautiful mother, Gloria Vanderbilt grew up in a special world. Stunningly beautiful herself, yet insecure and with a touch of wildness, she set out at a very early age to find romance. And find it she did. There were love affairs with Howard Hughes, Bill Paley, and Frank Sinatra, to name a few, and one-night stands, which she writes about with delicacy and humor, including one with the young Marlon Brando. There were marriages to men as diverse as Pat De Cicco, who abused her; the legendary conductor Leopold Stokowski, who kept his innermost secrets from her; film director Sidney Lumet; and finally writer Wyatt Cooper, the love of her life.

Now, in an irresistible memoir that is at once ruthlessly forthright, supremely stylish, full of fascinating details, and deeply touching, Gloria Vanderbilt writes at last about the subject on which she has hitherto been silent: the men in her life, why she loved them, and what each affair or marriage meant to her. This is the candid and captivating account of a life that has kept gossip writers speculating for years, as well as Gloria's own intimate description of growing up, living, marrying, and loving in the glare of the limelight and becoming, despite a family as famous and wealthy as America has ever produced, not only her own person but an artist, a designer, a businesswoman, and a writer of rare distinction.


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Product Reviews:
  gather ye facts where ye may 
It is quite irritating to read and re-read comments about Gloria Vanderbilt being unloved by her mother, her 'less than lucid' mother, or being harmed by a self absorbed mother. Perhaps those who believe these descriptions would do well to read "Double Exposure" by Gloria M. Vanderbilt and her twin, Lady Thelma Furness. This autobigraphy relates her mother's side of what happened at the custody trial (when wealthy, connected Aunt Gertrude 'won' little Gloria she no longer had an interest in her), the court allowed heresy and libel to colour testimonies and soil the reputation of mother and widow Gloria Morgan Vanderbilt as 'unfit'. Gloria M.'s own mother, Laura (little Gloria's grandmother) testified against her daughter at this trial with outrageous lies and unmotherly love. Read more about Grandma Laura's unstableness, selfishness, and self absorbsion (she left her oldest daughter at school in Paris during WW1 bombing seige). Grandma jetsetted around Europe shuttling her children to various boarding schools; she allowed her twins to move into a Manhattan apartment by themselves at age 16 to live there basically unsupervised. This was in 1922. Modern medical knowledge would most likely diagnose Grandma Laura as suffering from a neurological disorder. One wonders if it was passed down through the genes.
Learn of Gloria M's motherly love and pain of being torn away from her only daughter and the lies spun on both sides to keep them apart. "Double Exposure" should be offered in tandem with any Gloria Vanderbilt autobigraphy. Both sides of the story should be known before one can truly pass any judgement, and even then pause and ask yourself if either one is truly glorious and deserving of gushing praise for a life of having a 'good time' and 'getting lots of lovin'.
  Who is the real Gloria? 
This book lacks depth and leaves the reader feeling that we still don't know Gloria Vanderbilt. Also, why does she give the impression that she only has one living son? What kind of mother would disregard her two older children? Very sad.

A much better book on the Vanderbilts is "Fortunes Children". I recommend it.

  Unattainable 
I never received this book. A notice was sent to me saying the book was unattainable at this time.
  I would give it 3.5 actually 
The book was much shorter than I thought, and the writing was a bit too scattered, too many side notes - but good. I would average it out to be a 3.5 and you will find it funny, interesting if you know the characters or have read much about them. When you think of them as people it becomes harder to grasp, but characters seems a more realistic yardstick to use. I love Gloria Vanderbilt, I admire her and feel that she deserves applause and praise, but this one didn't do it for me. Maybe a good book to take traveling.
  Thank you for this wonderful book!! ( palace8 )
Dear Gloria Vanderbilt, i am enjoying reading your wonderful book. Thank you!! sincerely,
Joan Clement