Heartbreaker: A Memoir of Judy Garland

John Meyer

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0806527544 ISBN 13: 9780806527543

Publisher: Citadel Press Inc.,U.S., 2006

The author chronicles the life of the Hollywood superstar from his relationship and memories of her, covering her career, relationships, and struggles with both drugs and alcohol as well as life in the public eye.

Synopsis:

This is the true story of an incredible romance, a penetrating memoir of two months in the last year of Judy Garland's life, told by her unlikely lover - a man who found himself suddenly in a relationship with his idol. "Will you marry me? I never asked anyone before...but...will you marry me?" The voice belonged to songwriter John Meyer: the woman asked, his idol; a tarnished icon flickering weakly in the shadows of self-destructive abuse. The answer? "Why, yes...if you want me." And so Judy Garland joined her life with John Meyer, a songwriter with an entertainment slot in a piano bar on Manhattan's Upper East Side. To many, she was the wistful girl dancing down the yellow brick road; the wondrous young woman singing on the St. Louis trolley or, smeared in tears, on the apron of a darkened stage. Meyer tells how he and Garland fell for each other: how he valiantly tried to save her from pills, alcohol and her own erratic behaviour. And, how he grappled with something he was totally unprepared for: romance with his idol - a near mythic, tragic figure who had become flesh and blood.