Found: A Daughter's Journey Home [Hardcover]

Tatum O'Neal (Author), Hilary Liftin (Author)

Book Description

Release date: June 14, 2011

Academy Award winner Tatum O’Neal continues her inspiring true-life story begun in the 2004 New York Times bestseller A Paper Life with Found: A Daughter’s Journey Home—a moving memoir of discovery and reconciliation. In Found, the star of “Paper Moon,” TV’s “Rescue Me,” and the OWN (Oprah Winfrey Network) docuseries “Ryan and Tatum: The O’Neals” shares her hard-won insights on recovery, forgiveness, and the healing power of love.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

In this powerful follow-up to her New York Times bestselling memoir, A Paper Life, Academy Award^®-winning actress Tatum O’Neal returns with an extraordinary chronicle of family, forgiveness, redemption, and commitment—a remarkable story told with honesty, humility, determination, and above all . . . love

The golden child of a glamorous Hollywood couple, Tatum O’Neal had a childhood that looked, from the outside, to be fairy-tale perfect. The reality was far from perfect, and in A Paper Life, Tatum shared her poignant, painful experiences of growing up in—and away from—a dysfunctional show-business family. Now, in Found, she digs even deeper and explores the tough issues that resonate in most women’s lives. It is a story of taking two steps forward and one step back, of learning to understand what forgiveness really means—physically, emotionally, and spiritually—and how to live it every day. With candor and grace, Tatum chronicles the challenges and joys of being a single mother to three grown children, an ex-wife, a working actress, and a woman who has lived her life in the public eye for the better part of forty-five years. She speaks frankly about the persistence it took to beat her addictions to drugs and alcohol, and the hard work of staying clean and sober, including dealing with the deep emotional void that illicit substances falsely promise to fill.

Tatum details her ongoing efforts to negotiate friends, family, aging, money, love, loss, and Hollywood, while the specter of her past continues to lurk, a reminder of her battle and a testament to her will to survive. And she honors the people whose perseverance and courage in overcoming their own dark troubles have inspired her. Found is also a father-daughter love story: a portrait of a fragile, tentative reconciliation between a parent and a child who, as documented in the OWN television docuseries The O’Neals: Ryan and Tatum, try to heal the hurt and pain of a lifetime.

Tatum O’Neal has done the hard work necessary to get her life on track and come to terms with the person she is. Finally, she shares her whole story. Her moving and inspirational saga reminds us all that no matter what has happened in our own lives, we must keep moving forward to the light and the future, step by step, day by day. Only then may we find the true path home.

About the Author

The youngest actress ever to win an Academy Award^®, Tatum O'Neal has been a public figure for the last three decades. An actress, author, and the mother of three children, she makes her home in Los Angeles, California.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: William Morrow; First Edition edition (June 14, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0062066560
• ISBN-13: 978-0062066565
• Product Dimensions: 6 x 0.9 x 9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (44 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #587,988 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

The youngest actress ever to win an Academy Award, Tatum O'Neal has been a public figure for the last three decades. An actress, author, and the mother of three children, she makes her home in Los Angeles, California.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

54 of 54 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Eye opening June 20, 2011

By lytwhel

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

I never thought anything of Tatum O'Neal beyond her being a Hollywood brat. Whatever her life was, it didn't particularly interest me. Her drug and alcohol dependancies mattered not to me. Then, I saw her interview on CNN with Piers Morgan on June 17th, and I became interested in her "story". Over the weekend, I read "FOUND", then "A Paper Life". I then saw her as a person who grew up in a family, that was totally foreign to my life experience. She was no longer the Hollywood Brat, but a woman, who adored her father and loved her children. She was also an addict, who became a recovering one. Ms. O'Neal, according to her own words, was someone who was able to forgive those in her life who hurt her the most. Reading her two books made me reflect on my own life and the power to forgive and survive. She seems to be a woman who is well on her way to being strong and a model for others in recovery to aspire to.
Both books are well worth reading!
HL

28 of 29 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Superb Memoir--Beautifully Written, Heartfelt & Moving--Buy It Now!! June 23, 2011

By Anne C. Hodges

Format:Kindle Edition

Tatum O'Neal has done it again!! The little girl who won an Oscar at age 9 is now middle-aged and prepared, once again, to take us inside of her life with an honest, moving, and superbly written memoir which deserves nothing but the highest of praise from this reader. I HAVE to give this fantastic book 5 Stars as each page touched a different emotion in me during the day it took me to devour this thin volume. "Found..." is a perfect follow-up to O'Neal's previous work, "A Paper Life," and, in my opinion, the two books should be read in the order of their publication to feel the full effect of the true journey that the writer has taken throughout the last 7 years. Tatum's search to answer the many questions left unanswered by a lifetime and her strife to find inner peace in an extremely disjointed life contains a lesson that each of us could well take to heart, indeed.

Ms. O'Neal, in a kind, honest, and thoughtful voice, takes her readers through the mine field which has been her life: a neglected childhood with an alcoholic, drug addicted mother, her rescue from this peril by the movie star father who provides young Tatum not only with love, but also with the confusion of the Hollywood "scene," and an existence of living to please a demanding and often volitile and ill-tempered father. Upon his leaving his daughter to live alone at age 16 when he enters into a relationship with the beautiful Farah Fawcett, the vulnerable teen finds what one would expect...sexual abuse, alcohol, and drugs, which, in turn, lead to an early marriage to a yet a second often-angry man, tennis great John McEnroe, quickly leading to young motherhood to three children and a divorce.... The demons of addiction loom and seem to devour this fragile soul, yet, like a phoenix, she emerges to fight another battle...and to, with grace, forgiveness, and love, dive, emotions raw and open, into a life fueled with a desire to foster a full reconciliation with her long lost father and new, positive, and uplifting dynamics in her relationships with her now grown children.

As O'Neal's story unfolded, I found myself applauding for the author on each page of her wonderful book and, in my thoughts, I began to frame what I, as a reader, was taking away from the stunning, beautifully crafted words that were touching my heart. This book is a MUST READ...worth every moment spent engrossed in its' pages. Tatum O'Neal, once again, has touched my soul and made me a better person through her eloquently told life story. As the classic song says, "God Bless the Child Who's Got His Own"--and, Tatum, you, INDEED, do!! BRAVO...a Home Run Of A Read!! Read more ›

31 of 33 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars sad children June 20, 2011

By GH San Diego

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

I just finished this book in one day on my Kindle. It is well written and explains how painful it is for children to grow up in addicted and dysfunctional families.

It certainly helps you understand how each of us deals with life on a different reality. What some view as terribly sad others justify it by choosing their own version to not feel so guilty.

A must read for anyone who has lived a sad childhood. I know it helped me to get over some of the pain I had growing up.

GH San Diego

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Couldn't put it down July 14, 2011

By Scout

Format:Hardcover

Having grown up in the 70s with sex, drugs and rock and roll I could totally relate to this book and the stories of Tatum's life. In addition I recall all the tabloid stories regarding Tatum in the 70s and 80s so it was great to hear the real behind the scene stories from her.

I read this book in 2 days because I couldn't put it down. Here childhood was so sad and her teenage years had little parental supvision. I had friends with parents who got high with their kids and they are all either dead, in jail or in a 12 step program. This book is about survival!

The book is an easy read but you better start it on a Friday because you won't be able to put it down.

As a side note, in the 80s I was working at the Fairmont Hotel in SF while in college. Tatum and John McEnroe checked into the hotel. John was a total A hole; yelling at everyone and being completely rude. I remember Tatum looked embarrased and was trying to calm him down.

Later she came back down to the front desk and apologized to everyone, she was very sweet. One of the bellman who was clearly gay told her he had a crush on her when she was a little girl. She smiled and thanked him. It made his day. The sweetness I saw that day is evident in her writing and in her recollection of her life.

This is a must read - a great story about someone who looks like she might have had it all overcoming bad parents, neglect, a bully of a husband, and surviving it all

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Autobiography Par-Excellence August 6, 2011

By Patricia Turner

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

After reading `Found' I couldn't help but think what a credit to herself Tatum is. She candidly chronicles her feelings of abandonment, low self esteem, massive emotional upheaval etc., together with the drug and alcohol addictions these led to. Her innate need for her father's acceptance and approval reverberates throughout the story. Her abiding love for her mother, whose own addictions cheated them both of a rewarding relationship, is incredibly poignant. By all accounts Joanna Moore was a kind and gentle soul who, sadly, was weighed down by too many inner demons.

One of the most refreshing elements of this autobiography is the lack of acrimony and recriminations that mar so many other works in the genre. Tatum isn't blaming others for the way her life turned out; she takes responsibility for it herself. Yes, she does make a few disparaging remarks about several people, including her father, and her former husband, John McEnroe. However these are very mild and are not laden with the twin poisons of hate and spite. They are just honest comments that put certain aspects of her life, and various courses of action that she took, into context.

Her love for her children is all-encompassing. It's been the driving force in her struggle to beat her addictions. I'm full of admiration for the way in which she has turned her life around and feel extremely fortunate to have been able to read this compelling account of it.

Her family must be very proud and appreciative of her achievements. I'm sure her mother would be also if she was still alive. Tatum has proven herself to be a very resourceful and courageous human being and an exemplary example for others who may be attempting to get their own lives back on track....

This wonderful autobiography, with its unexpected depth, is one of the best I've read. Tatum shows that through her journey she has found her true and enlightened self. Read more ›