Such Good Friends: A Novel of Truman Capote & Lee Radziwill
Truman Capote and his circle of wealthy women friends – his swans – defined New York City’s high society of the 1960s and ´70s. Lee Radziwill, Jackie Kennedy’s sister, vied for position of head swan as Capote’s closest friend. We see Truman’s and Lee’s friendship and its unraveling through the eyes of Marlene, Lee’s personal assistant/cook. She is the only fictional character in a book peopled with dozens of the rich and famous in Truman’s circle. Along with his swans, Jackie Kennedy naturally comes in and out of Truman’s orbit since she and Lee were close, while Truman’s feud with Gore Vidal is amusing as they snipe at each other.
It is fascinating to peer into Truman’s extravagant life style, the struggles and triumphs of his writing life, and his tumultuous relationships with friends and lovers, but his descent into drugs and alcohol is distressing. As he struggles to deliver on his publishing contracts, repeatedly missing deadlines, clubbing and partying takes priority, and addiction consumes his life. When his story, “La Côte Basque,” was published in Esquire, his swans felt betrayed by his thinly veiled attempts to hide their identities. His poking fun at them and betraying confidences lost him many friends.
Greco’s research is extensive and exhaustive, while his journalistic-style writing includes an abundance of mundane details – e.g., measurements and colors of Lee’s choices in tile and wallpaper. The dialogue can be tedious, and name-dropping in the beginning is overwhelming until the relevant players surface. The use of Marlene as narrator is not convincing as someone privy to everything, and her personal story with a “secret” derails the story at hand. The larger-than-life Capote and Radziwill should have had the stage to themselves. This is still well worth reading because they were such icons of the era and their lives utterly riveting.
