No one chronicled–or lived–the 60s in LA like Eve Babitz. Her work has languished out of print for much too long. Now, at last, she’s being celebrated not just for her beauty and for the long list of men she inspired and caroused with before they became art and music superstars, but for her writing.
In the linked vignettes in Eve’s Hollywood, we experience what it was like to come of age in a lost bohemia and to grow into a writer who would chronicle a decade and time and place that now only exists in the pages of this book. The parties and scenes of decadence and adventure mingle with reminiscences of Hollywood High, with its 50 foot mural of Rudolph Valentino. Trash and treasure glitter together in Eve’s worldview and are often indistinguishable.
Imagine a Joan Didion who likes food and drugs and rock and roll and fun, or a Weetzie Bat a couple of decades early: that’s Eve Babitz. We hope you also find her writing irresistible.
You may purchase this book directly from NYRB.
Eve Babitz is also the author of Eve’s Hollywood and six other works of fiction and nonfiction. She still lives in Hollywood.
Sally had become a platinum blonde, which made her look like Kim Novak with a brain, and her career, as she referred to her life, looked like it might do something. She actually could act.
– Eve Babitz, Eve’s Hollywood
