On the spectrum of The Beach Boys’ California girls as "tanned dolls" and The Doors’ “L.A. Woman,” Joan Didion and Eve Babitz were…on spectrums all their own. This, despite the fact that brown-eyed Babitz was probably the inspiration for Jim Morrison’s lonely blue-eyed subject, which is a Babitz tidbit that is part of her myth. And the myth of Eve Babitz, as interesting as it is, is far less interesting than the truth about her.

This is what writer Lili Anolik has known for a long time. Her first book on Babitz, HOLLYWOOD’S EVE, was a fun, provocative and fascinating exploration of Babitz’s life, work, loves, struggles, reputation and accomplishments. After it was published, boxes of Babitz’s mostly unsent letters were discovered. One important thread running through them was her relationship with Joan Didion, that paragon of contemporary American literature. So Anolik has returned to pen a second book on Babitz, this time through the lens of her tense friendship and working relationship with Didion.

"Gossipy and deadly serious, intellectual and entertaining, heartbreaking and heartfelt, this book is unforgettable and highly recommended."

Anolik does her best not to retread ground from HOLLYWOOD’S EVE, but she does have to lay some track. Still, Babitz is such an interesting figure that any repetition is forgiven. Anolik introduces Didion as well, but DIDION & BABITZ is definitely not a traditional biography of either woman. Instead, using the letters as well as other texts and many interviews, including all the ones Anolik conducted with Babitz herself, what emerges is an exploration of the professional drives, the personal goals, the achievements and failures, the loves and losses, of two very different creative women who shared time and space and, at least occasionally, some emotional intimacy.

Eve Babitz was a moderately successful visual artist and writer during her life. Unfortunately, her talents were often overshadowed, and continue to be overshadowed, by her outsize personality. Raised by and around artists and musicians, she burst into the public view when she was famously photographed nude playing chess with Marcel Duchamp, who was, of course, fully clothed. She created the cover art for important albums, wrote for magazines and published books. But she mostly was known as a groupie or muse, a smart party girl who had affairs with rock stars, artists and moguls. Babitz was eccentric and honest, witty and fun. She was sexually liberated and supremely feminine, and she also struggled with drug use and to find her voice with her art.

At first blush, Babitz has nothing in common with Joan Didion, known for her icy personality and “masculine” writing style. But, like Babitz, Didion was a California native who was steeped in various creative scenes, spending her time with writers, musicians and artists. Babitz was critical of what she saw as Didion’s courting of and selling out to Hollywood, and Didion was critical of Babitz’s writing, acting as her editor for a time. Tensions, seemingly both personal and professional, eventually severed their friendship. Still, they remained linked, through mutual friends, common writerly impulses and perhaps in more deeply felt ways.

DIDION & BABITZ is a raucous, sprawling book. Anolik is smitten with Babitz, but that doesn’t keep her from analysis and critique. She admittedly is not Didion’s biggest fan, but she recognizes and celebrates her important contributions to literature and her accomplishments as an uncompromising writer. Both women are compelling, even larger-than-life, figures. Their social circles are almost unbelievably full of celebrities and creative elites, but their offerings are just as bold and genius as those of the people around them --- if not more so.

Anolik’s narrative style is loose, excited and conversational, not unlike Babitz’s own, which is the perfect tone and form for this particular look at Didion and Babitz. Gossipy and deadly serious, intellectual and entertaining, heartbreaking and heartfelt, this book is unforgettable and highly recommended.