A biography of one of the twentieth century's greatest fashion icons, reissued to coincide with the biopic Coco avant Chanel.

In this compelling biography, the author illuminates the dark corners of Patricia Highsmith's life, casts light on the mysteries of the creative process and reveals the secrets that the writer chose to keep hidden until after her death.

Jean Rhys (1890 1979) is best known for her 1966 novel Wide Sargasso Sea. A prequel to Jane Eyre, Rhys s revolutionary work reimagined the story of Bertha Rochester the misunderstood madwoman in the attic who was driven to insanity by cruelties beyond her control. The Blue Hour performs a similar exhumation of Rhys s life, which was haunted by demons from within and without. Its examination of Rhys s pain and loss charts her desperate journey from the jungles of Dominica to a British boarding school, and then into an adult life scarred by three failed marriages, the deaths of her two...

This exhaustively researched biography is filled with insights gleaned from exclusive interviews with Ava's colleagues, close friends and lovers.

Born in 1899 to Russian aristocrats, Tamara de Lempicka escaped the Bolsheviks by exchanging her body for freedom, dramatically beginning a sexual career that included most of the influential men and women she painted.