America's Queen: A Life of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis (Hardcover)

by Sarah Bradford (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
Fresh from her well-received life of Queen Elizabeth II, the English historian and biographer Sarah Bradford turns her hand to America's own answer to royalty, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. Painstakingly detailed, impressively fair, the result is the most definitive account yet of a woman who captured the imagination of the American public like no First Lady before or after her. Bradford seems to have interviewed almost everyone who had ever been intimate with Onassis, including George Plimpton, Gore Vidal, Joan Kennedy, and even a few ex-lovers. Most notably of all, Jackie's sister Lee Radziwill speaks with unexpected frankness about the mixture of rivalry and affection that marked their relationship since childhood. Jackie-lovers, take note: this is no hagiography, and its subject certainly comes off as no saint. As gracious as this American icon could be, she also had moments of coldness and even greed, including a particularly shocking moment by the bedside of Ari Onassis's dying son. Yet, in the end, non-airbrushed anecdotes like these only serve to make this most private of public figures even more fascinating. Jackie was, as Bradford writes, "a complex woman of many facets, concealed insecurities and intricate defense mechanisms, a strong urge toward the limelight contrasting with a desire for privacy and concealment.... Behind the mask of beauty and fame lay a shrewd mind, a ruthless judgment of people, antennae finely turned to any sign of pretentiousness or pomposity, and a wry, even raunchy sense of humor." The figure who emerges from subsequent pages is as compelling as the heroine of any novel, and it is to Bradford's credit that she doesn't seem to have fallen completely under her subject's spell. Her approach is sympathetic, but never fawning; candid, but never sensationalistic. For those who are curious not about Jackie's glamour but about its source, America's Queen offers an unprecedented look at the flesh-and-blood woman behind the Camelot myth. --Carlotta DeWitt

From Booklist
Jackie, we thought we knew you. Ray Olson
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Product Details

• Hardcover: 352 pages
• Publisher: Viking Adult; First Edition edition (October 23, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0670891916
• ISBN-13: 978-0670891917
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.4 x 1.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (36 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #148,561 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

35 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Iron Butterfly, March 18, 2001

By	Suzanne Smith (Illinois) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

A solid biography of a complex woman, Jackie Onassis. Bradford does her usual stellar job of peeking behind the curtain of mystery and into the lives of the rich and famous. This book makes a fine companion to her biographies of Princess Grace and Queen Elizabeth II. Bradford takes us from Jackie's earliest years as the adored eldest child of a wayward father, John Vernou "Black Jack" Bouvier; to the White House as the politically advantageous mate to an unfaithful John F. Kennedy; to Greece as the trophy wife of Greek tycoon Aristotle Onassis; and finally to the freedom and excitement of New York during Jackie's later years in the 70s and 80s.

We get to see behind the Kennedy mythology-Jack was as wayward as her father, and in retaliation, Jackie spent his money. Nanny Maud Shaw was pointedly left out of the many photo-exclusives the Kennedys gave to Life magazine, even though she was the main parental figure for Caroline and John, Jr. Coexisting in the First Lady was a woman who wore glamorous gowns and wowed dignitaries with her conversational skills and self-possessed manner, and a woman who smoked incessantly, hated campaigning, bit her fingernails to the quick, and was deeply wounded by her husband's infidelities.

Bradford's interviews are far-ranging: From Gloria Steinem to Jackie's younger sister Lee Radziwill, many of Jackie's acquaintances in Greece, Gore Vidal, her cousin John Davis, and some of her former flames, the people quoted in this book give us a glimpse of a privileged and often painful life. It is frankly stated that Jackie's repeated miscarriages and stillbirths were undoubtedly due contracting chlamydia from JFK. For years after the assassination of her husband, in odd moments Jackie would confide the hideous shock of holding parts of her husband's head in her hands. She had an embattled relationship with her mother, Janet Lee, and later with her sister, who was frustratingly left in the shadow of her sister's radiant beam. Many of the society wives who moved in Jackie's circle reported how possessive and flirtatious she was with their husbands. Far from being in love with Onassis (who had been having an affair with her sister), Jackie married him primarily for the security his vast fortune could afford her. Jackie was far more interested in championing the arts (her helping to start the foundation to restore the White House, her involvement in the campaign to save Grand Central Station), than in humanitarian and charitable causes, Bradford asserts.

This book could well have been subtitled "Iron Butterfly," as Jackie repeatedly gets what she wants (money, donations of antiquities to the White House, clothing) by being manipulative and irresistible at the same time. Yet despite not being the idealized version of herself we've all recognized over the years, Jackie is a fully-realized person in this book. I felt I knew more about her and her motivations after reading it, and not necessarily liking her any less for her flaws of character. The woman who stated her ambition in her Farmington yearbook as "Never to be a housewife" certainly exceeded that goal.

A good addition to your library-my only quibble would be for more attention to detail in the editing and more pictures we haven't already seen. Objective Jackie fans will not be disappointed in what, in the end, is a well-rounded portrait of an unforgettable woman.

25 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A remarkable telling of a remarkable story..., October 25, 2000

By A Customer

Sarah Bradford has accomplished something quite wonderful ~ the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis story told through perceptive, balanced, and caring eyes. If you thought there was little left to be said about the woman who captivated America and the world in the early 1960's, you should read this version of one of the most scrutinized life stories of the twentieth century.

Bradford has done a remarkable amount of research and distilled forty years worth of previously published writing into a compelling account. She augments her research with a large and impressive array of interviews with primary sources, including, for the first time on record, Jackie's sister, Lee Radzilwell.

And yet her account is riddled with nagging mistakes of tiny details, starting with the first sentance of the first chapter. Jackie was a thirty four year old widow in November 1963, not thirty five as stated. Small mistakes, yes, but God is in the details and it's a little jarring, undermining slightly her scholarly and well measured approach.

Nonetheless, her take on the life of "America's Queen" is riviting in its presentation and scope. Jackie emerges as both an icon and a person, a woman with a unique hold on our cultural psyche as well as a woman of the 1950's coming into her own through the years of a fascinating life.

A worthy addition to the Kennedy canon, and justifiably described as a "definative" biography.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Gives an indepth understanding of JBK, October 23, 2001

By	shirley lieb (Chicago, Illinois United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: America's Queen: The Life of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis (Paperback)

I plowed through this thick paperback fairly quickly. Here and there the author gets bogged down with such details as to the addresses of people that are involved with Jackie. The beginning section that deals with Jackie's childhood reveals not only her knowledge in dealing with such men as her father, but explains how she survived the behavior of JFK. The part of the book that takes place just prior to the assasination brings to the reader a bittersweet explanation of how they had finally found a closeness with each other that was enjoyed all too briefly.

Jackie was criticized by the press, plagued by photographers and misunderstood by the Kennedy family. With her unique personality, she manages to rise above it all and give some semblance of normalcy to her life and that of her children.

After reading the book, while I understand her better, I can't say for sure that I would have enjoyed being her friend. Her emotions seemed a bit too volatile for comfort.

I give the book high marks. Clearly there has been intensive research done here. Except in one of the photos of Jackie leaving for the Inaugural Gala. That was the night of Jan. 19th, not the 20th.

This one is going on my bookshelf to stay with the rest of my first lady collection.