Her soulful, soaring voice has earned her mythic status. Now, in her own moving words, the woman behind the myth is revealed. The result is a captivating self-portrait of one of this century's most fascinating artists, an Aretha Franklin as real as the songs she sings.
In this book, Aretha gets up-close and personal. In rich detail, she paints a vivid picture of a Detroit long gone: the storefront churches, the basement parties, the explosive R&B shows. She documents her life as a single teenage mother, working to balance home life with career, coping with two challenging marriages and, later, romantic relationships that were the source of both tremendous joy and unforeseen heartache.
Along the way, we meet the characters who lit up her life: her charismatic father, the Reverend C L Franklin; Sam Cooke, the man of her dreams; her singing sisters, Erma and Carolyn, and her manager-brother Cecil; her famous colleagues - Smokey Robinson, Marvin Gaye, the Temptations, Luther Vandross, and Luciano Pavarotti - as well as some famous rivals.
For the first time anywhere, Aretha tells her story - the glorious triumphs as well as the heartbreaking pain. With refreshing candor, Aretha tells it like it is, the way she sees it, the way she lived it.
