Jackie as Editor: The Literary Life of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

“A fascinating window into an aspect of Jackie Kennedy Onassis that few of us know.” —USA Today

History remembers Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis as the consummate first lady, the nation’s tragic widow, the millionaire’s wife, and, of course, the quintessential embodiment of elegance. Her biographers, however, skip over an equally important stage in her life: her nearly twenty-year-long career as a book editor. Jackie as Editor is the first book to focus exclusively on this remarkable woman’s editorial career.

At the age of forty-six, Jacket went to work for the first time in twenty-two years. Greg Lawrence, who had three of his books edited by Jackie, draws from interviews with more than 125 of her former collaborators and acquaintances to examine one of the twentieth century’s most enduring subjects of fascination through a new angle. Over the last third of her life, Jackie shepherded more than a hundred books through the increasingly corporate halls of Viking and Doubleday, publishing authors as diverse as Diana Vreeland, Louis Auchincloss, George Plimpton, Bill Moyers, Dorothy West, Naguib Mahfouz, and even Michael Jackson. Jackie as Editor gives intimate new insights into the life of a complex and enigmatic woman.

“Fascinating.” —Town & Country

“Perceptive, impressively researched.” —Publishers Weekly

“You can tell a lot about the late First Lady’s life by the books she loved, and those she edited in her nearly two decades as a publishing executive.” —O Magazine

“A deeply admiring portrait.” —Kirkus Reviews

“A must for Jackie fans.” —Sarah Bradford, New York Times–bestselling author of America’s Queen: The Life of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis