Customer Reviews

The Second Seduction

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Lear led a harrowing life that would have undone many of lesser mettle. I found her insights powerful on the effect unloving mothers and fathers have on their children and the subsequent victimization of those children by others (and their own selves). It deals with rough topics but the journey is worthwhile.

I loved this book years ago when it was given to me as a gift by a friend. I haven't read or seen or even thought about it in years, but I remembered one of the chapters the other day and went on a search to see if I could find the book. This was the only place I could find a copy! The writing is by the ex wife, now deceased, of Norman Lear, and she talks about everything in her life except her relationship with Lear. From depression to mania, from sexy to seductress to cutthroat business and rising above expectations. It's a poignant look into one of the most powerful women in her own industry, but more than that, it's written in such a way that it's thought-provoking and accessible.

She discusses her past, abuse, neglect, loneliness... and how those things still inform her present/future (though she is now deceased), and she talks also about dreams and hopes and aspirations.

I'm a fan of memoirs, in general, by those who can write well... this one is definitely at the top of my short list of favorite memoir-style books.

I hadn't read an entire book in quiet some time/Many Years,lol & I Never heard of this book or the author but I began reading it and I was "Hooked",it speaks of adoption,a mothers lack of Love,molestation,sex,bad relationships,lust,ect.and I enjoyed her life journey that many of us can relate too.For the small cost of this book I think it's worth it,the chapters are short & went bye fast enough to make the book go quickly too.
Sometimes we need to hear that we are Not the only ones who were hurt as children..

The founder of Lear's magazine and ex-wife of producer Norman Lear tells all and then some in a disturbing memoir that is searingly frank--though infuriatingly sketchy on biographical detail. Born in 1923 to an unmarried teenage mother in Hudson, N.Y., Lear was adopted by Herb and Aline Loeb. Aline was vain and deeply self-absorbed; Herb killed himself when Lear was ten. Sent as a teenager to a psychiatrist, Lear described how her new stepfather had been sexually abusing her for years. The psychiatrist told her mother and stepfather, her mother sided with the abuser, and Lear left home for good. Two failed marriages, retailing jobs in N.Y.C., and a succession of men followed. In 1956, at age 34, Lear moved to L.A. and married Norman Lear. As a character, the famed TV producer is almost completely absent here, although an abstract meditation on infidelity in Hollywood reads as a veiled reference to an unhappy marriage. Frances Lear went on to raise two daughters, divorce, and begin her magazine--all while battling manic-depressive illness. No subject is taboo here: Lear describes lesbian affairs, a stint in a mental institution, sex with her therapist, a dependence on marijuana, and difficult and needy relationships with men. Her deepest probings are of the depressive cycles of her illness and her suicidal urges. But while her full-tilt pursuit of the uncomfortable, the painful, and the unsavory may be admirable, Lear's eschewal of chronology, context, or any acknowledgement of her obviously considerable strengths detracts from her memoir's accessibility.