Cybill Disobedience
Cybill Shepherd
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I have to confess: I really only read Cybill Shepherd’s autobiography, Cybill Disobedience, because I saw it listed as a free digital download on KindleIQ.com, and while I do have standards, I’ll read anything from the backs of cereal boxes to eye wrinkle cream reviews if I’m doing it to test out a new toy. Or at least, the fact that it was a free download was why I began reading Shepherd’s book. She’s so honest and engaging, and funny, however, that very soon I was reading it for its own sake.

The thing about celebrity memoirs is that they’re more interesting if you have a decent working knowledge of the author’s body of work. In the case of Ms. Shepherd, I knew her from Moonlighting and the later sitcom that bore her name – Cybill, and liked both. I also remember her Loreal commercials (for hair color, not for eye wrinkle cream), and sometime in the last year she was in a Hallmark movie (or maybe it was a Lifetime movie?) about a divorced empty-nester who resumes her college education, which movie I quite liked. I knew nothing about her career in film from the decades before Moonlighting, nor had I any clue of her politics or her relationship history.

After reading the book, I was left awed by how very cool Cybill Shepherd is, politically and personally. She’s the kind of person I’d love to have as an ‘affectionate’ auntie, or stand next to in a protest march, and her book was entertaining, interesting, as candid as possible without jeopardizing the semblance of privacy her family needs, and really sort of compelling.

Goes well with sweet tea and barbecue.