Year of Ann Dvorak: Day 142

After a crazy week of going through all the items in the Ann Dvorak personal collection and revising the manuscript, I am happy to report that the revisions are done and approved, and everything has been sent to the designer.

I really have to hand it to the University Press of Kentucky for being so accommodating. Even though we were down to the wire, my copy editor didn’t think twice about having me incorporate the new information, which meant revising four chapters. She even had me write a preface to discuss some of the craziness I have encountered because of Ann. Fortunately, the materials in the collection tightened up the timeline of Ann’s final years and gave some great personal insight, allowing me to eliminate a lot of speculation in the last chapter.

I didn’t even bother to ask about using any of the photos because I was sure it was too late. Instead, they asked me if I wanted to use any of them. Since the price point for the book had already been set based on 69 photos, I could not add any, but was able to swap out some of the others. What I ended up using from the personal collection was four photos from the honeymoon scrapbook, one of Ann and her mother in 1969, and one of Ann taken five months before her death. The previous selections that were eliminated were all studio-issued photos, so no candids were sacrificed.

Even though the last week has been nuts and I am sick and tired of  working on this book, I am thrilled to have been able to tie up some loose ends and include a summary of Ann’s life in her own words. I always thought this book took an embarrassingly long time to finish, but in the end it really took as long as it needed to take.  Had it been scheduled to come out even a week earlier, these new finds, which are significant, would not have made it in. At this point, I honestly think the book is about as perfect as I could possibly make it – until it’s released and an avalanche of new info cascades on top of me.

Year of Ann Dvorak: Day 135

Ann Dvorak was not an easy subject to research for a full-length biography. She did not have children or any other close family members at the time of her death and did not leave behind personal papers to a research institution. I had to put her life together piece by piece which sometimes seemed like an impossible task, especially for her later years. All along I have been repeatedly told, “Just wait until the book comes out and then people will come out of the woodwork with info about Ann.” I figured this would be true, but did not expect for a bombshell to be dropped on me before the release date.

Three weeks after I submitted my final draft to the publisher, I received a cryptic message from someone claiming to have Ann’s possessions. My first reaction was, “yeah right,” especially when this person said that the contents included a large number of photos of Ann with Howard Hughes. They were not forthcoming with details, and for someone who was interested in selling the stuff, it was like pulling teeth to get any info out of them. Finally, I was able to determine that what this person had was a scrapbook of photos from Ann’s 1932 honeymoon. So, the man in the images was not Howard Hughes, but Leslie Fenton. The contents also included letters from a friend, routine papers like cancelled checks and bank statements, along with Ann’s journal. In other words, it was a collection of items I had been dreaming of finding for over a decade.

Well, this person was giving me such a hard time that I had to turn the matter over to a close friend who is also an agent and deals with difficult people all the time. It took two months, but the package finally came on Monday and even though not everything I was promised was there, the bulk of it is. The journal was misrepresented, as it’s only one entry from 1977, but there is an Ann Dvorak-sums-up-her-life quote, which is very insightful. It’s really the photo scrapbook that is a crown jewel. Dozens and dozens of photos, like the one above, of a young and vibrant Ann, madly in love, and seeing the world for the first time. That she held onto these photos for 30 years after the marriage ended and until her dying day speaks volumes about how powerful these memories were.The price I agreed on was far less than the $5,000 they asked for, but way more than the stuff was worth. However, the thought of Ann’s honeymoon album rotting in the trunk of this person’s car broke my heart, so I caved.

The good news is that my copy editor is awesome and invested in the book, so she’s working with me to squeeze in the additional information from Ann’s final years. I thought we were passed the point of no return on the photos, but I just found out that I can include these, though will have to sacrifice some of my previous choices to keep the photo count at 69. I think it’s worth it though.

If this is what’s going to happen pre-pub, I hate to think of what’s in store once the book comes out!