Friday, March 10, 2017

Book Review: The Princess Diarist

Title: The Princess Diarist
Author: Carrie Fisher
Publisher: Blue Rider Press
Publication Date: October 18, 2016
Source: Purchased

The Princess Diarist is Carrie Fisher’s intimate, hilarious and revealing recollection of what happened behind the scenes on one of the most famous film sets of all time, the first Star Wars movie.

When Carrie Fisher recently discovered the journals she kept during the filming of the first Star Wars movie, she was astonished to see what they had preserved—plaintive love poems, unbridled musings with youthful naiveté, and a vulnerability that she barely recognized. Today, her fame as an author, actress, and pop-culture icon is indisputable, but in 1977, Carrie Fisher was just a (sort-of) regular teenager.

With these excerpts from her handwritten notebooks, The Princess Diarist is Fisher’s intimate and revealing recollection of what happened on one of the most famous film sets of all time—and what developed behind the scenes. And today, as she reprises her most iconic role for the latest Star Wars trilogy, Fisher also ponders the joys and insanity of celebrity, and the absurdity of a life spawned by Hollywood royalty, only to be surpassed by her own outer-space royalty. Laugh-out-loud hilarious and endlessly quotable, The Princess Diarist brims with the candor and introspection of a diary while offering shrewd insight into the type of stardom that few will ever experience.



 My Review


With a heavy heart, I took to reading my copy of The Princess Diarist by the one and only Carrie Fisher. I have to admit that it took me a while to even want to read this because I thought I'd be too sad to read it after her sudden passing, but the book kept calling to me. So I read it. And boy... I'm so glad that I finally picked it up. Yes, there were moments of sadness, but most of my time reading was filled with laughter and admiration for the one and only space queen.

Taken from and expanding on her diaries during the filming of Star Wars: A New Hope, The Princess Diarist tells the story of Carrie Fisher's life during her time on and off set in London, England.

The book starts off with a little history lesson from Carrie Fisher as she informs her readers as to what was happening in the world during the time that Star Wars was being filmed. It's a nice way to set the pace of the book and to really let readers, especially those who might not have been born yet, just what the world was like in the late 1970s. From there, Carrie expands on her mother, father, family life, and the beginnings of her career as an actress before finally getting to everything that happened during the filming of Star Wars.

In the middle of the book, there are actual excerpts from Carrie's diaries. The poems and pieces of writing are so personal and emotional. Readers can see that she went through what most teenagers go through - falling in love and dealing with heartbreak, and even though she was falling in love with her co-star, it's all too relateable. Readers will also see the darker things that a few teenagers deal with - the struggles that Carrie faced and mental health problems that started to bog down on her. It's refreshing to someone, especially Carrie, write about them as if they are everyday things - because they are.

All in all, this is a great book, and would definitely be a book that I would recommend to anyone interested in what Carrie had to say during her sixty short years on this planet. Many different generations of readers will be able to appreciate Carrie's sense of humor, her intelligence, and her outlook on life and fame. It's a book that I didn't want to put down and I'm sure I'll be revisiting again.







Carrie Frances Fisher (1956 - 2016) was an American actress, screenwriter, and novelist. She is most famous for her portrayal of Princess Leia in the original Star Wars trilogy. She appeared in many other films, including Shampoo and When Harry Met Sally. Her books include the bestselling novels Surrender the Pink, Delusions of Grandma, The Best Awful, and Postcards from the Edge, as well as the memoirs Shockaholic and Wishful Drinking.

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