Audiobooks by Barbara Leaming

Kick Kennedy: The Charmed Life and Tragic Death of the Favorite Kennedy Daughter

Kathleen Kick Kennedy was the incandescent life-force of the fabled Kennedy family, her father's acknowledged favorite of all the children and her brother Jack's psychological twin. She was the Kennedy of Kennedys, sure of her privilege, magnetically charming and somehow not quite like anyone else on whatever stage she happened to grace. The daughter of the American ambassador to the Court of St. James's, Kick swept into Britain's aristocracy like a fresh wind on a sweltering summer day. In a decaying world where everything was based on stultifying sameness and similarity, she was gloriously, exhilaratingly different. Kick was the girl whom all the boys fell in love with, the girl who remained painfully out of reach for most of them. To Kick, everything about this life was fun and amusing--until suddenly it was not. For this is also a story of how a girl like Kick, a girl who had everything, a girl who seemed made for happiness, confronted crushing sadness. Willing to pay the price for choosing the love she wanted, she would have to face the consequences of forsaking much that was dear to her. Bestselling and award-winning biographer Barbara Leaming draws on her unique access to firsthand accounts, extensive conversations with many of the key players, and previously-unseen sources to transport us to another world, one of immense wealth, arcane rituals and rules, glamour and tragedy, that has now disappeared forever. It was a world of dukes and duchesses, of grand houses, of country house weekends, and of wild rich boys. But it was also a world of blood and war, and of immeasurable loss. It was a time of complete upheaval, as reflected in the life of this most unlikely and unforgettable central character. Kick Kennedy reveals her story, that of a young girl learning about love, sex, and death--and doing it all at warp speed as the world races toward war and then reels in the war's chaotic aftermath. This is the coming-of-age story of the female star of the Kennedy family, and ultimately a tragic, romantic story that will break your heart.

Barbara Leaming, Barbara Leaming (Author), Eliza Foss (Narrator)

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Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis: The Untold Story

The untold story of how one woman's life was changed forever in a matter of seconds by a horrific trauma. Barbara Leaming's extraordinary and deeply sensitive biography is the first book to document Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis' brutal, lonely and valiant thirty-one year struggle with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) that followed JFK's assassination. Here is the woman as she has never been seen before. In heartrending detail, we witness a struggle that unfolded at times before our own eyes, but which we failed to understand. Leaming's biography also makes clear the pattern of Jackie's life as a whole. We see how a spirited young woman's rejection of a predictable life led her to John F. Kennedy and the White House, how she sought to reconcile the conflicts of her marriage and the role she was to play, and how the trauma of her husband's murder which left her soaked in his blood and brains led her to seek a very different kind of life from the one she'd previously sought. A life story that has been scrutinized countless times, seen here for the first time as the serious and important story that it is. A story for our times at a moment when we as a nation need more than ever to understand the impact of trauma.

Barbara Leaming, Barbara Leaming (Author), Eliza Foss (Narrator)

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Bette Davis: A Biography

She was the tempestuous, strong-willed woman who ignited the movie screen with her legendary performances in Of Human Bondage, Jezebel, and All About Eve. Off-camera, Bette Davis survived four disastrous marriages and earned a larger-than-life professional reputation as an actress to be reckoned with. In this extraordinary biography, fans and film historians will discover a different, darker side of Bette Davis: a woman beset with scarring personal and professional doubts, who fought a lifelong battle with alcohol and had an insatiable need to be loved, often at great emotional cost. Obsessive and compulsive, Davis was happy only when she was working, but did not always choose her projects wisely. A legend, a star, a remarkable woman, Bette Davis lived her life as if it were a coveted role she was desperately afraid she might not win. “Leaming offers a portrait of Bette Davis that is both sympathetic to the actress and frank about her legendary bitchiness…The book is distinguished by its psychological understanding of the subject.”—Publishers Weekly

Barbara Leaming, Barbara Leaming (Author), Grace Conlin (Narrator)

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Churchill Defiant: Fighting On: 1945-1955

Winston Churchill rages against time and his own mortality in this tumultuous political drama of his last ten years of public life. Here is Churchill at his most outrageous, maddening, and devious-but also at his most human, courageous, and defiant. "I am an obstinate pig." This was how Winston Churchill described himself. At the end of July 1945, Winston Churchill was a defeated man-hurled from power by the British people at the end of the war in which he had just saved his country. Churchill Defiant is the story of how, when it seemed impossible, Churchill fought his way back over the next six years to the center of great events-the only place he ever wanted to be. In 1951, at last prime minister once more, he was ready to begin his dash to win "the last prize I seek": the enduring peace that had eluded the world after Hitler's defeat. But Churchill's battles were just beginning. He would have to wage war with both his closest colleagues and his most indispensable allies, the Americans, to get where none of them wanted him to go: the negotiating table with the Soviets. Barbara Leaming has written a gripping, fast-paced narrative of bare-knuckle politics, of life-and-death decisions, of old grudges and fresh blame. It is the story of how, between 1945 and 1955, Churchill simultaneously fought to prevent a third world war and to defy his own mortality as the clock ticked away and time threatened to run out for him. This is Winston Churchill in close-up-a compelling, vivid, and deeply poignant portrait of the great man at a time when almost no one wanted him to remain on the public stage and when he was willing to do absolutely anything to stay there.

Barbara Leaming, Barbara Leaming (Author), Simon Prebble (Narrator)

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If This Was Happiness: A Biography of Rita Hayworth

The legendary "Love Goddess" was a huge box-office star, and her sultry beauty and sensational figure turned her into the ultimate sex-symbol. Yet behind the smoldering image lay a tragic secret that wrecked her private life. Extremely shy as a child, Rita Hayworth was forced by her vaudevillian father to be his dancing partner-and he abused her as well. Her need for protection led her into five disastrous marriages. If This Was Happiness is at once sensational, revealing, and compassionate.

Barbara Leaming, Barbara Leaming (Author), Anna Fields, Anna Fields (Narrator)

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Orson Welles: A Biography

Genius, artist, monstre sacré, Orson Welles had one of the most brilliant and tempestuous careers in show business. Here he confides his most intimate feelings and recollections of his extraordinary life. With remarkable detail and intimacy, Barbara Leaming reveals the private Welles: from child prodigy and young lion in Dublin and New York, to the succÃ¨s de scandale of his The War of the Worlds broadcast; from his auspicious directing debut with the legendary Citizen Kane in his twenties, to the sabotage of his further directing career by the Hollywood studios; from his affairs, carousing, and stormy marriage to Rita Hayworth, to his association with Roosevelt and aspirations to the presidency. It is a picture with an all-star cast, including Olivier, Monroe, Dietrich, Garbo, Warren Beatty, Charlie Chaplin, Princess Margaret, and Prince Aly Khan. "[The] next best thing to a Welles autobiography....An entertaining read that unfolds like a good novel."-Amazon.com

Barbara Leaming, Barbara Leaming (Author), Grace Conlin (Narrator)

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Katharine Hepburn

Hollywood has produced many stars, but no one compares to Katharine Hepburn. She is the last of the great ones: a celebrated actress, a brilliant personality, an original. Barbara Leaming has discovered thousands of never-before-seen documents that finally illuminate the mystery of this enigmatic, fascinating woman. Based on letters by Hepburn, her friends, and her family, as well as interviews with Hepburn herself, Leaming's book is a family story that brings alive three generations of fearless women, personal and political crusaders who shaped the history of women in our century.

Barbara Leaming, Barbara Leaming (Author), Sandra Burr (Narrator)

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