Take another little piece of my heart

Pamela Des Barres spent the sexual revolution on the ramparts as the celebrated "queen of the groupies" and chronicled her adventures with the high priests of rock in her best seller I'm With the Band. Affectionate, subversive, and funny, it was hailed by The New York Times as representing "something honorable and loving... about the sexual honesty of modern women." It became an underground classic, an emblematic memoir of the 1960s generation.

Take Another Little Piece of My Heart picks up where that story left off, with Pamela's embarkation on the Hollywood brand of postmodern marriage and motherhood. The Des Barreses face the same problems as any other American family but writ large: To make ends meet they share quarters with another struggling couple - Don Johnson and Patti D'Arbanville - and take in a boarder, ex-Sex Pistol Steve Jones. When her acting career founders despite a stint with Sly Stallone, Pamela sells Mary Kay cosmetics, with the help of fledgling star Jeff Goldblum. When her marriage ends, she finds consolation dancing with Bob Dylan, romancing Dennis Hopper, and befriending Sandra Bernhard, as well as through spiritual healing.

For all its famous names and insider lore, this is a survivor's story - about the anguish of coping with loved ones' addictions, about suffering divorce and loss, about the joys and terrors of raising a gifted son. And Pamela comes through it all with her grace, her charm, and her generous sense of humor intact. Take Another Little Piece of My Heart is a rollicking, piquant, sometimes heartbreaking document of the middle-passage years of the baby-boom generation, and a hilarious, inspiring tussle with life's adversities.