The New York Times Book Review - Sheila Weller
Though her life did not hold the challenges familiar to the 99 percent, it took strength to stay sensible amid temptations that felled others—and not to let her self-esteem be destroyed by a manipulative father. Anjelica Huston has long seemed a person of integrity and wistfulness…This book—not profound but quite delicious—shows how those qualities grew in both hospitable and inhospitable soil.
From the Publisher
Huston comes by her vivid life stories honestly. They are her birthright. And how fortunate for readers that she’s an easy and graceful storyteller. Read this memoir for the thrilling, improbable sentences that stop you cold. Most of all, read it for the sheer pleasure of listening to someone render a memory so tactile you can astrally project yourself there.” —Joumana Khatib, New York Times
“Anjelica Huston grew up in what sounds a fairy tale—magically beautiful, yet tinged with loss, sadness, and monsters.” —Kate Tuttle, Boston Globe
“An elegy for a vanished world, A Story Lately Told becomes a seductive social history of the 1960s—and the story of Huston’s fractious separation from an indomitable father and grief for the loss of the mother who was the ballast of her life.” —Sheila Weller, The New York Times Book Review
“Impressively written in a style that is as graceful and natural as breathing and as observant as that by a ‘born writer.’... Huston comes of age surrounded by talent, pot, fame and photographers, and tells her tale with unexpected distinction.” —Jeff Simon, The Buffalo News (Editor’s Choice)
“Anjelica Huston has lived a big, colorful life—big and colorful enough to fill two volumes of an autobiography... Huston has a way with a descriptive phrase, and it’s on display in A Story Lately Told.” —Jocelyn McClurg, USA Today
“Huston’s lovely, novelistic writing carries the book... As a storyteller, she’s having more fun than a monkey in a lingerie drawer.” —Melissa Maerz, Entertainment Weekly
“Evocative.” —Mary Pols, People
“An elegant, funny, and frequently haunting reminiscence of the first two decades of her life...A classic.” —Graydon Carter, Vanity Fair
“A Story Lately Told contains a plethora of compelling tales.” —Maggie Lange, New York Magazine
“Huston’s privileged childhood is described with great texture. The enormous estate in Ireland where her family lived is a rambling, magical place. The names that are dropped in this book don’t constitute name-dropping, but are simply the names that populated her childhood... Huston is a smart and subtle enough writer not to aim for a pop diagnosis, but instead, once again, goes for something truer, deeper and richer... A stirring memoir.” —Meg Wolitzer, NPR
“A Story Lately Told is peopled by names like Carson McCullers, John Steinbeck, Peter O’Toole, Marlon Brando, Monty Clift and the succession of gorgeous, interesting women who made up her father’s peripatetic life. Anjelica can really write. The prologue alone to her memoir is worthy.” —Liz Smith, Huffington Post
“Structured in short, colorful vignettes, A Story Lately Told shows off Ms. Huston’s fabulous memory, keen observations and lovely use of language.” —Carol O’Sullivan, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
“Compelling, thoughtful, starry reading...What’s particularly enjoyable about her story is the rhapsodic way that she beautifully describes that bygone world.” —Alexander Larman, The Guardian
“Elegant and economical.” —Helen Brown, The Telegraph
Philadelphia Inquirer - Carrie Rickey
A Story Lately Told proves that Huston is a third-generation storyteller. As she chronicles her earliest memories through age 22, she echoes the rhythms and structures of novels like Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and What Maisie Knew, focusing on surface sensations of youth while implying profound internal changes.
The Buffalo News (Editor’s Choice) - Jeff Simon
Impressively written in a style that is as graceful and natural as breathing and as observant as that by a ‘born writer.’…[Huston] comes of age surrounded by talent, pot, fame and photographers, and tells her tale with unexpected distinction.
NPR - Meg Wolitzer
Huston’s privileged childhood is described with great texture. The enormous estate in Ireland where her family lived is a rambling, magical place. The names that are dropped in this book don’t constitute name-dropping, but are simply the names that populated her childhood…[Huston] is a smart and subtle enough writer not to aim for a pop diagnosis, but instead, once again, [goes] for something truer, deeper and richer…[A] stirring memoir.
Huffington Post - Liz Smith
[A Story Lately Told] is peopled by names like Carson McCullers, John Steinbeck, Peter O’Toole, Marlon Brando, Monty Clift and the succession of gorgeous, interesting women who made up her father’s peripatetic life. Anjelica can really write. The prologue alone to her memoir is worthy.
People - Mary Pols
Evocative.
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - Carol O’Sullivan
Structured in short, colorful vignettes, A Story Lately Told shows off Ms. Huston’s fabulous memory, keen observations and lovely use of language.
Reuters - Ellen Freilich
If a storytelling gene exists, Huston inherited one from her father, the Oscar-winning director John Huston, and another from her mother, the ballet dancer Enrica Soma, who nurtured in her children a love of books and a gift for observation.
Showbiz 411 - Roger Friedman
A wise, witty, and wonderful autobiography.
Shelf Awareness
Intriguing…Huston offers a fascinating account of her charmed childhood (peppered with celebrities coming to dinner) and her rebellious stage.
Orange County Register - Samantha Dunn
Told in lush prose, [A Story Lately Told] is at once an eyewitness account of the social history of London and New York in the '60s and '70s, a wistful remembrance of childhood in an idyllic Irish country manor, and an exploration of what it meant to be reared at the crossroads of celebrity and culture as the daughter of director John Huston (“The African Queen,” “The Maltese Falcon”) and his fourth wife, Italian-American ballerina Enrica Soma.
Boston Globe - Kate Tuttle
Anjelica Huston grew up in what sounds a fairy tale—magically beautiful, yet tinged with loss, sadness, and monsters.
Colm Tóibín
A Story Lately Told is filled with glitter, glamour and excitement, but it is underpinned by loss, solitude and estrangement, and the need to tell the truth, which makes the book memorable and affecting. Anjelica Huston’s account of growing up in Ireland is fascinating and masterly, as is her version of life in London and New York in the 1960s.
Entertainment Weekly - Melissa Maerz
[Huston’s] lovely, novelistic writing carries the book….As a storyteller, she’s having more fun than a monkey in a lingerie drawer.
Mike Nichols
A Story Lately Told is written with the magic of the Irish and a touch of the family genius. From her vivid descriptions of growing up in the horse country of County Galway, Ireland, to her glimpses of rough glamour in the Chelsea Hotel, Anjelica's writing shines with her particular mix of intelligence, beauty, wit, and courage. Her book is gorgeous.
Jewish Journal of LA - Joy Bennett
Elegantly written…Told with grace and honesty. You would expect no less from this fascinating, unusual woman.
Guardian (UK) - Alexander Larman
Compelling, thoughtful, starry reading…What’s particularly enjoyable about her story is the rhapsodic way that she beautifully describes that bygone world.
Vanity Fair - Graydon Carter
An elegant, funny, and frequently haunting reminiscence of the first two decades of her life…A classic.
Telegraph (UK) - Helen Brown
Elegant and economical.
New York magazine - Maggie Lange
[A Story Lately Told] contains a plethora of compelling tales.
USA Today - Jocelyn McClurg
Anjelica Huston has lived a big, colorful life—big and colorful enough to fill two volumes of an autobiography…Huston has a way with a descriptive phrase, and it’s on display in A Story Lately Told.
Joan Didion
Lucid, loving, all a memoir should be.
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - Carol O’Sullivan
Structured in short, colorful vignettes, A Story Lately Told shows off Ms. Huston’s fabulous memory, keen observations and lovely use of language.
Colm Tóibín
A Story Lately Told is filled with glitter, glamour and excitement, but it is underpinned by loss, solitude and estrangement, and the need to tell the truth, which makes the book memorable and affecting. Anjelica Huston’s account of growing up in Ireland is fascinating and masterly, as is her version of life in London and New York in the 1960s.
Vanity Fair
Extraordinary.
Kirkus Reviews
2013-09-25
An Oscar-winning actress from a celebrated entertainment family recalls her peripatetic childhood and adolescence, her various awakenings and epiphanies. The granddaughter of Oscar winner Walter Huston (1949, for The Treasure of Sierra Madre) and daughter of Oscar-winning actor and director John Huston (1949, The Treasure of Sierra Madre, for directing and screenwriting) writes that she "was a lonely child." However, so many personalities and celebrities swirl through the story that we begin to wonder about loneliness in a crowd. Born in 1951, she soon became a part of her father's world, though he was often absent, off filming. She adored her mother (John's fourth wife) but would soon learn that her father's carnal needs were immense. He would marry a fifth time but also carry on multiple affairs with--it seems--just about any woman who would yield. The earliest sections of Huston's memoir are the strongest: poignant details about her childhood affections, the men and women who worked on the Irish estate purchased with her father's film profits (his habitual gambling ever endangered all), the quotidian routines of girlhood. But as time progresses, the memoir sags. Soon, her selection principle seems to be "I remember this, so I'm including it," and a phone book of names assails readers, challenging both memory and interest. However, there are some amusing anecdotes--e.g., a plane ride with the Monkees, an appearance with an oddly detached Johnny Carson on the Tonight Show. The death of her mother (car crash) was obviously traumatizing, as was a longtime affair with photographer Bob Richardson, an affair that veered toward abusive before its end. This first installment--to be followed next year with the second volume--concludes as the author heads to Los Angeles. Banality clutches the text tightly, too rarely releasing its wings.
