Goodbye, winter caps—hello, summer hats! It’s that glorious time of year where many of us can switch from content creators to content consumers. NYWIFT members Mellini Kantayya and Kathryn O’Kane have put together #SummerHours, a series of fun summer books, movies, and TV shows by or about women.
The framework for Carrie Fisher’s last memoir, The Princess Diarist, is the discovery of old journals that she kept during the filming of Star Wars in 1976. For the Star Wars fan, the memoir delivers: from auditioning for the role, to reading the script for the first time, to the biggest reveal – the brief affair she had with co-star Harrison Ford.
Any memoir of Fisher is now made bittersweet by her untimely passing. I recommend the audiobook version read by Fisher where you can hear her reveal her witty and whimsical warts-and-all approach to life for the last time.
(Cover photo by Bridgette Matthews)
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1 Comment
Mellini_Kantayya
I adore her and can’t wait to dig into this one!