The Princess Diarist
Ratings119
Average rating3.7
40% through the audiobook and throwing in the towel.
Carrie is a delight but this book was extremely misleading. It's advertised as her days during the filming of the first star wars films. There is very little about star wars in this book. It's about her relationship with Harrison Ford and about her drinking, drugs, and sex experiences.
Longer and more cohesive than Wishful Drinking - the diary excerpts from shooting Star Wars were fascinating! Could've done without a lot of the poetry, though, but that's just my thing.
Sigh... I'm normally such a huge fan of memoirs - even somewhat poorly-written/ghost-written memoirs of celebrities. And I love Carrie Fisher, and Star Wars. The book is short (I swear the margins are 2 inches, at least - and more for the diary portions) and not worth the price (though this was given to me as a gift, so I suppose I can't complain). It was interesting reading about her affair with Harrison Ford, and how that played out in the head of an unstable 20-year-old also about to grapple with the deluge to come with instant fame... but mostly it was no better than reading my own diary as a 20-year-old (except that I wrote far less terrible poetry). I mean, it's nice to see that she's human too, and to peer inside her brain at the time and her thoughts on the experience now is enlightening. But overall I didn't enjoy the book and was disappointed. That's to say nothing of her character, or her as a person or artist. Perhaps her other books are better - but after this one, I'm not sure I'll give them a chance.
3.5 stars. It was really sad and nostalgic at the same time to have Carrie Fisher narrate this audiobook, but it was also perfect that she did so. Her humour and with really shines through. Though the brief excerpt of her rather poetic diary snippets are read by another younger narrotor, it was also appropriate. However, I felt that the book didn't contain anything earth-shattering beyond that Big Reveal, and she rambles quite a bit towards the end. Still, it's an interesting insight into the life of a celebrity so iconic she's become a cultural fixture. We will miss you, Carrie!
Première fois que je découvre Carrie Fisher par l'écrit, et je me rends compte d'à quel point elle pouvait être touchante et humaine. Profondément fragile et honnête. Ce livre traite principalement de ses angoisses de jeunesse et du tout premier Star Wars, de son rapport au succès, aux fans, de son crush adolescent sur Harrison Ford, un ensemble au final extrêmement touchant. Triste qu'elle nous ait quittée.
Carrie Fisher's usual wit and inside look make this a really enjoyable read about the origins of Princess Leia and her life since her iconification. I highly recommend it for any fans or human beings.
A very fast read and definitely glad I was able to get the audio edition; Carrie Fisher is hilarious reading her own words. What she wrote in her diary was not as wide spread on topics as I'd hoped but does give a good sense of what she worried about and interestingly, how creative she is at expressing her thoughts.
Shine On, Sweet Princess.
Since I was nine and the original Star Wars came out, I have been a big fan of Carrie Fisher. Back then it was “only” because Princess Leia was a kick-ass character. As I grew older I learned a lot about her and her life and I became even more of a fan, because she was also a kick-ass character in real life. Strong, vulnerable, smart, funny and inspirational.
That's why it hurts a bit to say that I didn't find this her best book. Not bad by any means, but I just knew 98% of it beforehand (that's the downside of being a fan, you search for every little thing about your idol, before you ever get the chanc to read their memoirs ;) ). It still has her trademark humour and snark, though, and that I could never tire of.
So, why do I give it 4 stars?
The pages from her diary. Maybe it was the timing, but her frustration, love, sadness, confusion, all resonated very deeply with me and actually brought a bit of a heartache, and a tear to my eye.
I am saddened than in less than a year we will have seen her last movie ever. And saddened that we will never see an interview with her again.
Shine on, Carrie. You will never be forgotten.
Funnier than I expected. The diary parts were poetic. The story itself is complicated and I'm not totally sure what to think about that.
I listened to it and that was almost magical. Hearing Carrie read her words was awesome.
The first book I read by Carrie Fisher was [b:Wishful Drinking 4961048 Wishful Drinking Carrie Fisher https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1347698159s/4961048.jpg 5026857], a work in which she exposes herself in a very sincere and passionate way. From then on, I gained a deep admiration for the actress, realizing that she has faced good and bad times throughout her life.Because of her tragic death last year, I decided to read [b:The Princess Diarist 26025989 The Princess Diarist Carrie Fisher https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1482921522s/26025989.jpg 45949491] and, once again, I “met” Carrie Fisher in her rather intimate writing, not only revealing an old diary from her days in Star Wars IV, but also punctuating a few other moments of her trajectory as an actress and as the personification of Princess Leia Organa.The book is very interesting, being a very sincere and harsh telling of her life experience. Fisher acknowledges to have been quite insecure in the mid-1970s', a point that has affected her in subsequent years. As I began to accompany the actress on social networks, I realized that her long learning process lasted until the last day of her life. One of the last tweets of the actress was about the critics of the fans about her aging and the arduous passage of time.The book is very beautiful, especially when the actress shows her reflections about her aging, her relationship with her mother, her relationship with Star Wars fans and, most interestingly, her relationship with Princess Leia, always punctuated by several behind-the-scenes photos. The ending is quite sad, marked by another very emblematic photo of the actress's career.I was quite saddened by the end of reading, feeling that we all lost a great human being, very sensitive and who still had much to teach us much more about humanity.
I had originally planned for this to be my first read of 2017, but then the end of December 2016 happened and I couldn't quite get myself to start this.
A lot of this book looks back on how Carrie Fisher experienced the first Star Wars movie. Before, during, and after. Inspired by her finding the old journals she wrote during the filming of it.
Carrie was like no other, and this book is at times surprisingly comical, but also really dark. The journals (read by her daughter, Billie Lourd) are touching and beautiful but also sad.
What also takes up a lot of this book is her affair with Harrison Ford, and it's hard to not look critically at it, especially when she was still so young compared to him. But I digress.
This was a great listen, even if she tended to go on rants that seemed to go on and on without really getting to a point. So even with this already being a relatively short book, it wouldn't hurt to have been trimmed down a little or edited a bit more. My only real gripe though, and I'll surely look out for some of her previous books.
Wahhhhhh, come back, Carrieeee
I have to say I preferred the framing from Adult Carrie of her memories & then her experiences at fan conventions etc to the actual diaries of her ~affair with Harrison~...I did admire the vulnerability in them, as well as some very funny asides, but it also almost felt...too private and made me weirdly uncomfortable?? Poor lil baby Carrie :(
Still, if you're a fan of Carrie Fisher/Star Wars there's a lot to love here.
I miss Carrie Fisher. I miss her sarcasm, her willingness to stand up in a fight, her constant talk about her real problems, not a one of which she ever blamed on anyone else. This book isn't a love story about Carrie and Harrison. It is, however, in some ways, a love letter to the character who took over Carrie's life. To Leia's affect on her in all ways.
For a fan who was there from the beginning, this book is a reminder of life before, and life during the uproar that was Star Wars. It reminds me of who she and Mark and Harrison became, and how fresh and new they were in that first film. We all owe them so much.
Read this if you love Carrie Fisher. Read this if you love Star Wars. Read this if you're curious about the affair (but don't expect a grand, sweeping love story). But most of all read this if you are a fan who grew up during this time, who remembers that time before, who loves the characters, who loves Carrie.
I love Leia. I love Carrie. And I'm so grateful she got to share this with us before the end. I miss her every day.
This is clearly me not even trying to be unbiased. Her words to her mother in the acknowledgements made me cry.
Also, she was quite the talented writer even at nineteen.
Gods, I can't even right now...
This book honestly surprised me. Not because I expected it to be bad, but rather I didn't expect it to be so good! Fisher paints a beautiful and suspenseful picture of what it was like to be on the set of Star Wars when it was just getting started. I felt like I was pining over the latest gossip with my girlfriends over a fresh bottle of wine and a couple of late night greasy pizzas. I felt like I was Fisher's friend and her down to earth nature and complete frankness was hysterical. Would read again and would definitely recommend to anyone who has prior knowledge of the Star Wars universe and and wants a fresh take from a fantastic narrator.
This is a very poor account of the filming of the original Star Wars trilogy, as it was proclaimed to be. Instead it is a lot of whining about how Harrison Ford is hard to read.. so meh. Carrie Fisher is witty at times, and I was intrigued until it got to her diary entries. And then I just wanted to die rather than finish this little stomp down memory lane.
3.5 - 4. Parts are really funny, hearing Carrie read it is great, but some parts of the book don't really translate well to audio-only format.
I think this might have just been the wrong book for the wrong reader. I've seen all the Star Wars movies - they're fine, I wouldn't say I really like them, but I get it. From what I'd heard of Carrie Fisher's previous books, she sounded like a fun/funny lady. But after this one, I'm not sure I want to try another of her books.
I listened to the audiobook. It wasn't that long — only four discs, and she narrated it, which is usually a sign that I'll enjoy a memoir-style book — but around halfway through the middle of the third disc, I kept hoping the book would end. At several points, I wondered if I would have liked it better if I had a paper copy in front of me. I thought her writing in her journal entries was excellent (significantly better than the writing in the rest of the book), but they dragged on too long, to the point where I was bored of hearing about “Carrison” and wanted to move on. The stories she told didn't feel very cohesive, and there was a lot of not-outright-complaining-but-still-kind-of-complaining about her fans that was a turnoff for me.
Disappointing to be sure, but again, maybe it's me and not Carrie.
I love the princess. And I think Carrie is one of the coolest persons who ever lived. That given.. the book was ok. Not inspiring or especially educating.
I enjoyed the insight into the late and great Carrie Fisher but it left me wanting more.