Clark Gable Books

This is an excellent book, with perhaps the best word portrait of Lombard in existence, and with that portrait, one understands better the man Gable was after January 16, 1942. The text gives a well developed dimensional portrait of Gable that explores the darker sides of the man - and gives credible support to the Hollywood conviction that Carole Lombard died because of Gable's womanizing, specifically citing Lana Turner (Gable had just started work on 'Somewhere I'll Find You' with Turner when Lombard left on her war bond tour).

I found this book to be a sort of boring story of the life of Clark Gable. Also there has been information about Clark Gable that makes this book out of date.

The book hardly mentions Loretta Young and in the early 1990's it came out that Clark Gable and Loretta Young had a secret love child. Instead of this I would recommend the biography by Warren Harris instead. It is more up to date

Clark Gable was The King long before Elvis started shaking his booty and long before Elvis even had a booty to shake! It's refreshing, in this biography, to read what a humble man this gorgeous, virile man had. Far from being the Rhett Butler-egomaniac, Gable actually thought he wasn't "that good-looking!" "I'm just a lucky slob from Ohio," Gable is quoted in the book as telling an interviewer.

Known largely for his on-stage role as Rhett Butler in Gone With the Wind, also starring Vivien Leigh -- and his off-screen romance with Carole Lombard, Gable wooed more women than he ever could have bedded, what with those "come hither" eyes and dimples. Every woman who watched Gone With the Wind would have changed places with Vivien in a second in the famous "rape" scene where he roughly sweeps Scarlett in his arms and carries the kicking and screaming wife up the stairs. Of course, anyone who knows anything about love, Scarlett and that movie knows it surely wasn't rape!

Tornabene's book explores Gable's extreme professionalism as an actor and bits and pieces of the private life he chose to hide while alive. He was even described by the media as "boring" because he wouldn't talk about his private life!

Interesting in the book is that this journalist decided to make a most humble move and talk to a pscyhologist about the research to gain a different view of Clark Gable, as research alone provided pieces to the Gable puzzle but not the entire picture.

This is a well researched bio of Clark Gable. He was not a perfect man but some of his issues certainly had their roots in the crushing poverty of his youth. It seems that with him what you saw on the screen was pretty much the man. And what a man! I enjoyed this book thououghly and reccommend it to anyone interested in Gable and Hollywood movies of the 30s, 40s and 50s.

Book was in excellent condition and a wonderful read. Gable led an interesting life and it was revealed with great detail. If you interested in biographies on celebrities from MGM era, this is a book to read.

This is not a definitive biography of Gable by any means. Its merely o.k. The writer portrays Gable in a variety of ways from male/whore/pimp to broken down/shattered/griefstricken to a man obssessed with his masculinity and sexual prowess. Gable may have been the epitome of masculinity in the movies and it is this that earned him the title of "King". The writer attempts to portray Gable as a martyr throughout the entire book. The fact of the matter is that the truth lies somewhere in between. Gable was a womanizer and it is a well-known fact that he would have sex with anything with skirts on. It is also a well-known fact that Gable, by his own admission, was not THAT GREAT an actor. He was competent most of the time. He was brilliant in "It Happened One Night", "Mutiny on the Bounty" and "Gone With the Wind". It is no coincidence that he was Oscar nominated only for those performances. It is also a well-known fact that Gable had a homosexual encounter with William Haines (MGM's biggest male star of the silents)in order to advance his career. It is also a well-known fact that Gable used his first two wives to further his career, cheated on them and ultimately divorced them. But it is also well-known that they used him too. The writer wants to portray Gable as a saint. Saint he was not. The book has its merits. It reads well (albeit with inacurracies) and is interesting, if you can overlook the gossip, tabloid style with which it is written.

He lifted whole passages from Lyn Tornabene's bio "Long Live the King" but did not list her in the bibliography.

I just bought this book and noticed that Warren Harris list Clark Gable character in "Cain and Mabel" as "Joe Cain" instead of "Larry Cain" which is the actual name of the character.

How many other things are wrong in this book?

If you're looking for a detailed biography of the life of this Hollywood couple, this book is not for you. This is a short read that will give you an idea of what Gable & Lombard's relationship was like, and offers a brief glimpse into the lives of each. For an in-depth view into the two stars' lives, I recommend separate biographies for each, instead of this book which is only good for the merely interested reader.

I have ordered this book thinking it would be the perfect companion to the Gable & Lombard video (that great film directed by Sidney J. Furie, starring James Bronlin and Jill Clayburgh).
But...what a disappointment! The book has no life, I mean, no grace, no charm, Mr. Warren G. Harris seems unable to focus in the mood of the 1930s. Enjoy the movie, forget the book.

This is one of the worst books ever written in this or any other genre. It's an insult to Clark Gable and Carole Lombard, not a tribute to them. Avoid at all all costs!

This book is for all those Gable and Lombard fans. This book is a true hollywood love story. It gives a complete history of Gable and Lombard affair with some humor added in. You should buy it or check it out of your library today!

A fun-to-read book especially if you admire Carole Lombard like I do. She died before I was born, but I think she is the woman I most admire and look to as a hero

Hollywood's moral values were not those of the rest of the country even in the 1920's & 30's. Anywhere else Clark Gable is a cheating swine. Nobody knew this at the time because big brother MGM protected it's own from unpleasantness leaking out to his adoring public. His acting ability & magnetism allowed him to have any women anytime he wanted, if you believe the author Jane Ellen Wayne. She blows hot, cold & lukewarm on her subject. I guess that passes for objectivity.
Gable was a whinner, over-sexed & never satisfied. His first two marriages to older mentors were shams. They served their purpose & were discarded. He cheated on them both regularly.
His rise to stardom was slow & tedious, like the first two tapes of this audio version. But then it picked up. He was committed at first to the live stage. But, like many other legitimate actors, he was seduced by the $$$ to be made in Hollywood. His timing was excellent. Many silent era stars could not make the transition to talkies. His voice was very masculine & very sexy. He cleaned up his act with a new set of teeth & physique. He life was owned by MGM. He never had the backbone to defy Louis B. Mayer. He hated him & griped constantly, but did what he was told. MGM in turn, made him their biggest star, & his fans could not get enough of him. He was dubbed the King of Hollywood & never relinquished that title. He was a working actor & made many very good movies such as "It Happened One Night", "Saratoga", five with Jean Harlow, & of course "Gone With the Wind".
The turning point in Gable's life was his marriage to THE love of his life, Carole Lombard. She died a hero's death as she returned to California from a bond drive early in the war. She was flying back rather than taking the train & her plane crashed in the mountains near Las Vegas. She had decided to fly because either she missed Clark very much (they were in love with each other) or she suspected him of cheating on her. Lana Turner, Joan Crawford, or ??? Take your pick. He was fooling around on the only women he ever really loved. He never recovered from her death or the guilt he felt. This made him a more serious, introspective & maybe better actor. He saw action in the Army Air Corps in World War II but was pulled out of the line of fire when it became more of a hassle keeping Hollywood's greatest star from harm than it was worth. A remake of the 1932 movie "Red Dust' was renamed "Magambo' with Ava Gardner & a young Grace Kelly was probably his most ballyhooed post war movie. Others such as "Run Silent Run Deep" were also pretty decent.
A lifetime of abusing his body plus a lot of booze & cigarettes were
taking their toll. The great male actors were dying in the 50's. Bogart, Cooper, Flynn, all gone. Gable died shortly after making "The Misfits" with Marilyn Monroe, also her last movie. His only child was born to his fifth wife, Kay Speckles, shortly after his death.

Started reading this book after the death of Katharine Hepburn. Gable is another one of those great stars I know and love only from GWTW and black and white movies on TCM. I knew little of his personal life, except for his storybook marriage to Carole Lombard. This book filled me in on his background. I had no idea he worked so hard on the craft he made look so effortless. Nor did I know how complicated he was. Knowing this will make me appreciate his work that much more. Does it bother me that the biographer writes as if she was in the room for some of the conversations? Not really. This is, after all, a movie star biography, not a history book. If Gable had been a politician or statesman, it might concern me more.

I didn't really like the book and the author seems to reiterate information from her different books into others. I had just borrowed the book from the library as well as the book on Grace Kelly and neither this or the book on Grace had any pictures to speak of and any author who cannot be resourceful enough to get pictures to include in the biography is lazy or did not try hard enough...others have been able to so why can't she? So you definitely can't say I am her biggest fan.

This biography is saddled with many flaws. It often reads like one of those silly romance novels one sees at the literature sections of such famous bookshops as Walmart, K-Mart, Walgreens and B.Daltons. It is filled with irrelevant gossip, much of it more suitable for a luncheon of late-middle aged hens rather than a serious biography. The author's interviews with Joan Crawford(one of Gable's many lovers) dominate too many sections of the bio; much of what Miss Crawford says is taken at face value with little to counter-balance her assertions. Most undefensible is the author's portrayal of intimate conversations as if she were there with a microphone and tape recorder. Many of the precise "conversations" alleged by the author were between two people long since dead. How would Jane Ellen Wayne know precise conversations between Louis B. Mayer and Clark Gable? Both have been dead for over thirty years. Did the author interview either man from beyond the grave? This technique of the author is most dishonest. However, this biography has some very good points. Gable's early life and rise are covered in great detail. The author's desriptions of the big studio milleu of pre-TV Hollywood are interesting. The author paints a thorough personality portrait of Gable- his calculated decisions, his high sex drive, his alcoholism, his love of the outdoors, his tight wallet. Gable's marriage to Carole Lombard is handled rather well. Oddly, the Gable-Lombard marriage reminds one of the marriage of the current First Couple in the White House, only Carole Lombard is better looking and much, much better humoured than Hillary R. Clinton and Clark Gable is much more manly than Bill Clinton. Clark Gable is worthy of a fine biography; Jane Ellen Wayne's is not it, however.

This bio of four big stars from Hollywood's golden age is fairly fun, but strictly lightweight; there is no annotation, for instance, and consequently the facts don't seem as unassailable as they should. It is the kind of thing that would be an enjoyable beach read for the casual movie (or gossip) fan--but not something for serious fans.

I am so glad that I read through this book at the book store instead of spending good money for it. If anyone wants to read a biography of Clark Gable, this is NOT the book to read. It is full of inaccuracies and provides no sources for the outrageous claims it makes. Examples of some of the inaccuracies include: the entire cast of Mutiny of the Bounty was gay, the Bilton hotel (instead of the Biltmore or maybe he meant the Hilton), Gable took off his shirt to show no undershirt in It Happened One Night not Red Dust, Paul Muni won a supporting actor Oscar for Black Fury (no way), it is Gene Raymond not Gary Raymond, etc. He provides no sources whatsoever for his outrageous claims against Gable. He also seems to feel that every unmarried woman is a lesbian. I recall an interview with Robert Wagner where he said once a celebrity dies - anyone can say anything about them they want and the family has no recourse. Well, this author certainly did his best to smear Gable but those wanting the facts, will do their research (unlike the author) and read the books that present sources for their information including Lyn Tornabene's Long Live the King. Another reviewer was right in saying one star is one too many for this book.

You've got to be kidding me with this "biography"! (I gave it one star only because the review option makes me choose one; otherwise it would have none!) Everything you read in the other reviews is correct about the poor spelling and grammar, and innaccurate facts and general bad aura this book puts out, so I won't repeat all of that here. What I will point out is the glaring error that occurs when this dolt of an author can't even get it right regarding Gone With the Wind. One of the most famous scenes in the book is when Scarlett stands on Tara's land after the Yankees have come through, and vows never to be hungry again. Remember that one? On page 148, David Bret states that Scarlett's line from the movie is "lie, cheadle, cheat or kill." Huh? Cheadle? Yeah, I threaten to 'cheadle' everyday...whatever. If he can't even quote a movie line correctly, then how can a reader feel confident that the other research is accurate? You can't! Take a pass on this one - I'm sorry I bought it for my public library.

I'll agree with many of the reviewers here - Bret's book doesn't really delve into who Clark Gable was as a person. And there are grammatical errors galore.
However, I'm not quite sure why people are so quick to dismiss the accounts of Gable's bisexuality. It seems unlikely that an author would fabricate so many accounts of homosexual acts with Gable. I'm not 100% convinced that Gable was "gay for pay", as Bret asserts, but I definitely think there's enough information there to make one at least consider the possibility. Don't forget that in Hollywood's heyday, to be homosexual would have meant death for an actor career-wise, so it's no wonder so many actors (and actresses) were closeted.
Overall, it's not a complete waste of time, although the play-by-play for Gable's various movie roles is tedious. But it definitely opens up a different way of looking at one of Hollywood's greatest stars.

It's odd how this book misnames Gable's character in Soldier of Fortune (1955) as Mike Lee, instead of Hank Lee. So does the earlier Warren Harris biography of Gable...Just a coincidence?

Not worth the trees that were destroyed to create the paper for its publication. Mr. Bret seems to have facts and information privy to no one else but himself. and is driven by some strange force to make it public. He seems to have "inside" information most of which is of no great value.