Karen Stewart: This review is reprinted with permission from www.gaytoday.badpuppy.com online.
A couple of years ago, I came across a book by Chastity Bono titled Family Outings. When I first saw the book, I remembered “Chas” mainly from the 1970s as the leggy, blonde-haired six-year-old daughter of Sonny and Cher.
For the benefit of those too young or too TV-repulsed to remember, at the end of the Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour, Chas would appear with her parents as they sang their closing (and opening and middle) hit, “I Got You Babe.”
Even back then, I suspected Chas of being a lesbian child, for the simple fact she reminded me of me when I was six! So it came as no surprise in later years when I learned that Chas is in fact a lesbian.
Although I admit to serious misgivings about what the lesbian daughter of Sonny and Cher would have to say of value to the world, I found Family Outings to be well written and insightful. What distinguished Family Outings from other coming out collections was its emphasis on the effect of the coming out of a gay family member on the entire family instead of just the individual coming out.
In her first literary effort, Chas shared the details of her own very public outing in the tabloid press as well as the coming out stories of several “regular,” i.e., non-famous gays and lesbians and their families.
Included in the collection is a wonderful story of Kentuckian Rev. Ben Guess and his family, who together led the drive for fairness legislation in Henderson. Chas' analysis of family dynamics was especially thoughtful and balanced in its approach.
So when I was handed Chas' latest effort, The End of Innocence, I looked forward to seeing what insights she would offer up this time. I don't know what I expected from the book, but what I got wasn't it.
The End of Innocence is Chas' memoir about her relationship with Joan Stephens, a woman 23 years her senior, a friend of Cher's. The narrative spans the years from Chas' first crush on Joan at age thirteen until Joan's death from non-Hodgkins lymphoma eleven years later.
Chronicled is Chas' first long-term relationship with Rachel, whom she met during her one and only year as a student at NYU. She and Rachel spent the following summer in Europe and, while in Paris, decided to form a band and become professional musicians. Of course, Chas had no musical training and played no instrument, but that never stopped Cher, so why should it stop Chas?
Back stateside while pursuing her musical career, Chas and Joan continued to see one another socially, and then to steal away for romantic moments together, though both were in relationships with others. This, of course, led to a fair amount of dyke drama between and among Chas, Rachel, Joan, et al., ad nauseam.
Chas and Joan eventually became lovers and, like a page out of Love Story, Joan, now in her early forties, was stricken by cancer. She underwent every kind of cancer therapy there is, including exhaustive rounds of chemo and a stem cell transplant, to no avail. Chas becomes her devoted caregiver while admitting to helping herself to Joan's stash of Percodans.
Ironically, the night Joan died, Chas found herself in bed with…Rachel!
There is precious little insight contained in the book's 219 pages, either with regard to Chas personally or in a larger sense. That doesn't mean that the book isn't worth a look.
For those willing to wade through Chas' banal accounts of the formation of her band, there are some truly poignant accounts of what it is like to be the lesbian partner of a cancer patient. For example, while Joan underwent stem cell harvesting, a series of three- to five-hour sessions, Chas writes:
“During one of the sessions, she didn't feel well, so I comforted her while sitting on the edge of her bed, holding her hand and stroking her arm-nothing a person wouldn't do for a friend or family member. But a female doctor on duty came over and told me, ‘This is a public place. You can't do that type of behavior here.'
“Amazingly, I did what she asked and moved away from Joan. When I thought about my response later, I was appalled, I couldn't believe I didn't tell her to go f*** herself. But I was in an altered state. And still in the closet.”
Although the passages about the formation of the band “Ceremony” are sophomoric and banal, parts of the story are compelling if for no other reason they give us another window on the surreal life of the daughter of the two very surreal multifaceted personages of Cher and the late Sonny.
If you are expecting a book similar in stylistic quality and clarity to Family Outings, you may be disappointed. If you want to read a somewhat surreal lesbian version of Love Story, you'll find this thin volume to be a real page turner.
On a scale of 1-100, I rate The End of Innocence a 65. The beat's not bad but the lyrics need work.
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