The End of Innocence: A Memoir [Paperback]

Chastity Bono (Author), Michele Kort (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1, 2003

For the first time, Chastity Bono shares the moving story of her early adulthood: how her traumatic tabloid outing as the openly gay daughter of Sonny and Cher threatened her burgeoning musical career, and how her first true love was taken from her by cancer. At an early age, Chastity survived challenges many of us never face. A story of love won and lost, of dreams fulfilled and destroyed, The End of Innocence is a coming-of-age story that provides a deeply personal look into the private struggles of a very public and courageous woman.

Chastity Bono was first known as the daughter of Sonny Bono and Cher, when she made appearances on her parents' TV show, The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour. She established her own identity after coming out on the cover of The Advocate in 1995 and went on to become a reporter for the magazine. Since then, she's worked as the 1996 National Coming Out Project's spokesperson for the HRC. From 1997 to 1998, she was the Entertainment -Media Director for GLAAD. She is also the author of the bestselling Family Outing and continues to lecture around the country.

Michele Kort is an award-winning journalist whose writing has appeared in the Los Angeles Times Magazine, L.A. Weekly, Shape, Redbook, Self and The Advocate. A Los Angeles resident, she is also the author of Soul Picnic: The Music and Passion of Laura Nyro.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

If Bono's story doesn't end up as a Lifetime TV movie, it will at least merit an episode of E! Hollywood True Story. The lesbian daughter of Sonny and Cher follows up her excellent coming out guide, Family Outing (1998), with a slim, honest memoir covering her turbulent life in the years between 1988 and '93. Bono and her girlfriend, Rachel, formed a band, hoping that performing together would revitalize their waning relationship but things didn't work out that way. The Star tabloid outed Bono shortly after she and Rachel signed a record deal with Geffen Records. The two novices stayed closeted while they tried to record a CD and deal with Rachel's alcoholism and the fact that Bono had fallen in love with Joan, a beautiful, 40-something friend of the family who had just been diagnosed with cancer. Bono's fear of confrontation drags out the misery for this love triangle (and the reader) during the book's middle section, which sometimes plays like an overwrought episode of MTV's Real World. Oddly, the recording-studio scenes lack passion, and with no discussion of lyrics or orchestrations, Bono seems like an outsider in her own musical group; it's hard for the reader to feel much empathy when their single tanks. The last half of the book, when Bono commits to Joan just as her health begins to deteriorate, packs an emotional punch with brutally frank depictions of loving and living with a person with a terminal illness. Bono spares no one, including herself, with a wrenching and exhausting finish.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

This is no Mommie Dearest. It's not even a biography ofChastity Bono, daughter of Sonny and Cher. Rather, this is a memoir ofthe time Chastity spent with her lover Joan Stephens, a friend ofCher's, someone Chastity had been attracted to since she was13. Chastity, in her early twenties, and Joan got together after Joanwas diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. As the duo got closer, theillness progressed, until Joan died after a long, painful battle withcancer. Unlike's Drescher's Cancer Shmancer (see below), there'sno upbeat tone here. Bono's chronicle of Stephens' illness is detailedand depressing. The uberstory, Bono's coming-of-age saga, alsoencompasses her coming out, career problems, and other relationships,but the focus is on what it's like to be a caregiver to a dying lovedone. Bono (and writer Kort) offer a vivid piece although readers maywonder how she kicks the prescription drug habit she acquired duringStephens' illness. Chastity will be on the talk-show circuit, so maybethat question will be answered there. Ilene Cooper
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 232 pages
• Publisher: Advocate Books (June 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1555837956
• ISBN-13: 978-1555837952
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.2 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,426,372 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars check your expectations at the door, August 20, 2003

By 

Duke Marine (Newbury Park, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The End of Innocence: A Memoir (Paperback)

I think the only thing that could ruin this book is wrong expectations. I came into it thinking "Ooh a book by Cher's daughter! Cher is God so I should read it!" and when I found out it was about her lover Joan's battle with cancer I was like, "Aw, sad! This is gonna be depressing!"

neither expectation proved true!

By the end of the book I not only did I have a deep respect for Chastity Bono as her own person, not just Cher's daughter, but I was deeply inspired by the story and life of Joan! The book is really a very inspiring tale of love and life and everday, universal struggles (despite the fact its mainly about fame, the music industry, battles with cancer, and the struggles of lesbians). Its really a very triumphant book whose only fault is the fact that it was written by someone so young so the ending comes all too soon. I hope for a sequel!

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars It's her life..., April 12, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: The End of Innocence: A Memoir (Paperback)

No better way to find out who Chastity Bono is than to read her story in her own words, written in her own way. It's not sugar coated and painted as a pretty picture. It doesn't focus on her Mother, and her life wasn't a fairy tail sort of life. Hers was a life full of struggles. A major one her relationship with Joan. Anyone else ever take care of someone with a terminal ilness? All when she was very young. The cancer patient gets the Morphine to dull their pain, and the shot to help them sleep, but their friend in the cot next to them gets nothing to dull their pain and fears, and nothing to help them through their many sleepless nights. At home, they give the shots and clean the bed sheets. The sad part is many do not get so much as a thank you, and the patient gets the flowers. That is not meant to take away from the patients suffering. But, what her book brings out is the fact that many times the care takers and loved ones are suffering because it is a hard and emotionally draining job, and for them there is no relief.

How else to give you a sense of who she was, other than to tell exactly what she was going through and how she felt, and ultimatly how she dealt with it all. It is not a feel good book. It's just an honest story and a quick read.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A personal autobiography of great love, grief, & courage, September 6, 2002

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The End of Innocence: A Memoir (Hardcover)

The End Of Innocence is the personal memoir of Chastity Bono, the daughter of the famous entertainment celebrities Cher and Sonny Bono. With the literary assistance of Journalist Michele Kort, Chastity Bono recounts her lesbian love and partnership with Joan Stephens, as well as the horror of watching the woman she loved succumb to non-Hodgkins lymphoma. The End Of Innocence is strongly recommended reading as deeply personal autobiography of great love, loss, grief, courage, and the will to live one's own life on one's own terms.