John, Cynthia Lennon
John, Cynthia Lennon
1 Rating(s)
List: $13.75 | Sale: $9.62
Club: $6.87

John

Author: Cynthia Lennon, Julian Lennon

Narrator: Cynthia Lennon

Abridged: 4 hr 57 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 09/27/2005


Synopsis

The Extraordinary Story of a Man, a Legend and a Marriage

When she was eighteen years old, a girl named Cynthia Powell met a boy named John Lennon and they fell in love. Their ten-year relationship coincided with the start of the Beatles phenomenon—from Liverpool’s dockside clubs to the dizzying worldwide fame that followed. And Cynthia Lennon, John’s first wife, was an integral part of the swirl of events that are now an indelible part of the history of rock and roll.

In John, Cynthia recalls those times with the loving honesty of an insider, offering new and fascinating insights into the life of John Lennon and the early days of the Beatles. And with the perspective only years can provide she also tells the compelling story of her marriage to a man who was to become a music legend, a cultural hero and a defining figure of the twentieth century.

Cynthia has seldom talked in any detail about her marriage and the painful events that followed John’s tragic assassination in 1980. Now she candidly reveals the good and the bad, the loving and the cruel sides of John. She tells of the breakdown of their marriage and the beginning of his relationship with Yoko Ono in more detail than has ever been disclosed before and documents the difficulties estrangement from John—and his subsequent death—brought for herself and their son, Julian.

In John, Cynthia Lennon has created a vivid portrait of the 1960s, the Beatles and the man she never stopped loving.

The time has come when I feel ready to tell the truth about John and me, our years together and the years since his death. There is so much that I have never said, so many incidents I have never spoken of and so many feelings I have never expressed: great love on one hand; pain, torment and humiliation on the other. Only I know what really happened between us, why we stayed together, why we parted and the price I have paid for being John’s wife.

I want to tell the real story of the real John—the infuriating, lovable, sometimes cruel, funny, talented and needy man who made such an impact on the world. —From the Introduction

About The Author

Cynthia Lennon was born in Blackpool, England, in 1939. While attending the Liverpool College of Art she met John Lennon, whose rebellious style, caustic wit and passion for rock and roll already marked him as someone different. John and Cynthia married in 1962 and their son, Julian, was born in 1963. The Lennons were divorced in 1969. Cynthia retained custody of Julian, who saw his father sporadically until John was killed in 1980. In the years since, Cynthia has been a restaurateur, a designer and a television personality. She now lives in Spain with her husband, Noel Charles.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Brianna on March 09, 2008

It's no secret I adore Cynthia Powell Lennon, and I have for years. If you come across this book without knowing her, you might expect this to be a trashy exploitative novel on what it's like to be John Lennon's ex-wife. In that case, you're going to be disappointed. She doesn't shy away from present......more

Goodreads review by Nyusi on November 01, 2009

This proves an interesting read for John Lennon-ophiles. However, Cynthia Lennon comes across as something of a deluded and unreliable narrator who unwittingly communicates to the reader that she does not have the facility to understand the complex man John was, or have any idea what he was really u......more

Goodreads review by Brian on March 10, 2008

I actually got this book by accident. I was looking for a recent John Lennon biography (call it a John Lennon kick I was on) and w/o looking at the author I put this one on hold at the library. The author is his first wife, Cynthia Lennon, who unfortunately has become a footnote in the Beatles/John......more

Goodreads review by Lynx on July 21, 2018

When Cynthia first met John Lennon he was an 18 year old teddy boy more interested in being class clown and playing his guitar then focusing on school work. Both students at the Liverpool College of Art, Cynthia soon found herself looking forward to seeing him, laughing at John’s sharp wit and swoon......more

Goodreads review by Karen on January 12, 2009

Cynthia is an old-school class act. She hasn’t written an ex-husband bashing tell-all, although she’d be perfectly justified in doing so. With warmth and honesty she revisits her relationship with John Lennon from their pre-Beatle whirlwind romance through their marriage and divorce, until his death......more


Quotes

“Lennon’s eyewitness testimony vividly captures the time and place and the characters . . . her portrait of John is loving but candid.” —Washington Post

“A welcome window into a period that’s typically narrated at breakneck pace, [providing] a gentle reminder that John Lennon was a human being . . . before he was a piece of history.” —Detroit Free Press

“[Cynthia Lennon’s] portrait reveals an immensely talented and driven man who was capable of great passion, affection, and loyalty, but whose inability to handle confrontation and tendency toward flight from painful realities led him to abandon his family when the going got tough.” —Buffalo News