I can't begin to explain the way this book makes you feel. Reading this book made me want to get out in the world and do something nice for someone else. This is a book I will want to read over and over again, and HIGHLY recomend you read it!

What a wonderful book! It pushes all the right buttons, in all the right ways. What more could a reader who needs motivation ask for! These stories are phenomenal, and they deserve everyone's attention. If you have not read it, do so, and if you have think of someone you have not recommended it to, that you could. It's a message worth sending, and, as the book shows, no positive effort is ever wasted! I LOVE this book!

Although I worked on this book with Jackie (I photographed many of the people who are profiled within), it is, of course difficult for me to be unbiased. But after meeting twenty of these exceptional people, it is hard to come away from this book untouched. They are truly an inspiration to us all, with Jackie at front of the class - leading the pack. I am thrilled to be associated with a book like this, a book that can motivate us all to get up and DO SOMETHING FOR OTHERS!

Joan Fontaine's re-telling of her own life is a riveting book for any movie enthusiast to enjoy. As she talks of her childhood, her infamous rivalry with her sister, and her many movies and love affairs, the reader gets the sense that Miss Fontaine is not only a fabulous actress and a beautiful woman, but also a fabulous and beautiful human being.

Joan Fontaine writes beautifully and I found her book a fascinating mixture of her personal, private life and her public life. She pulled no punches and is honest about her accomplishments as well as her shortcomings. She details her early life in California and the chism between she and her sister with honesty and forthrightness. The custody battles over her daughter with her ex-husband were well-documented in the press at the time they were occurring and she relates this stuggle and at the same time trying to be a good mother and still earn a living. Her life may not have been a bed of roses, but neither was it a crown of thorns. A highly recommended read.

I really like Joan Fontaine before I read her story. She came across to me as a spoiled, self-centered human being. She put her career and husbands before her children. Why do women have children if they are going to pawn them off on housekeepers, nannies, and ex-husbands? I don't think mother should be used in her vocabulary. She not only had four husbands, but also committed adultery while married to them. Joan did what Joan wanted to do and became very wealthy doing it. If you want a good read about this type of women, go ahead and buy the book, better yet, do what I did and buy it at a garage sale.

Only until matters are cleared up by Olivia de Havilland--and assuming she will ever finish her autobiography--will we hear her side of the de Havilland story. Joan's "No Bed of Roses" was dismissed by one of her ex-husbands with the comment, "It should have been called 'No Shred of Truth'." And certainly Higham's book contains all kinds of errors, including a jumbled paragraph that attempts to describe the plot of "Hold Back the Dawn" and gets cast and plot mixed up with another film. Nor is he always tactful when characterizing either sister, playing one in an unfavorable light and then reversing his viewpoint with an equally damaging portrait of the other. Finally, it's hard to know just what to believe. Interestingly, Brendan Fraser has bought the screen rights to this novel--lots of luck, Brendan.

Published in 1984, 'Sisters' tells the real life story of the feud between two sisters who both became oscar winning Hollywood stars. I found it all very interesting to read but was left feeling doubtful as to the accuracy of Mr Higham's information. The book centers mainly on the feud and doesn't go into any great depth about their work. Higham only met de Havilland once in 1965 and Joan Fontaine once in 1977 and on the whole he appears to prefer Joan. Having long been an admirer of de Havilland I was not to keen on the picture Higham painted of her as a quick tempered, overly romantic, egotist. At times it seems Higham is just embellishing to make the story seem more like a 'story' (eg when Olivia, Joan and their Mother scatter their fathers ashes; and as their mother tossed the ashes out 'a strong wind blew them into her face. It was Walter de Havilland's last gesture toward his hated wife') and there are many errors and inconsistencies (eg Higham makes the careless mistake in the opening chapter in saying that Fontaine won her oscar for 'Rebecca' which as any film historian should know is the film she should have won the oscar for but didn't, winning it the following year for 'Suspicion'; and on page 131 Higham describes the plot of one of de Havilland's films and manages to completely confuse it with the plot of a totally different film). I did find the chapter charting the de Havilland ancestry back to Norman times fascinating but all too brief. Still I don't know that whether what Higham writes is all true or not but still I shall wait for the publication of Miss de Havilland's autobiography before I believe too much of what is in this book.

I did enjoy this book, which tells you about the lifes of joan fontaine and olivia de havilland. No surprises here at all, the sisters couldn't get on and it was a matter of who would be the most awful towards the other one; still what is funny is that those women are extremely similar and yet couldn't stand one another when indeed they were quite a reflection of one another, physically and mentally.

This short book in free verse style (like Out of The Dust) about childhood memories would be excellent in three areas: to read aloud in installments for Quality bedtime; to read in one sitting; and to assign as a first book to be read by young students, who will then respond to easy questions and do minimal research. The simple pleasures and homespun concerns of life in rural Oregon are preserved in Claudia Lewis' poetic journal, as she gradually realizes that her pre war world is slipping into the past-- impacting both her town and her family. Joel Fontaine's bountiful b/w sketches create an aura of fragile and tender childhood, soft as pastels, reflecting Lewis' poingnant vignettes of a bygone era. This is a gentle introduction to journals and historical fiction for elementary children.