Anderson Cooper

I really wanted to like this book. The idea of an intimate correspondence between mother and son appeals to me both as a mother, and as a daughter. I often wish I knew more about my mother; that I understood more about her life and why she believes the things she does. I was looking forward to an intimate glimpse at Anderson and Gloria’s relationship, their deepest yearnings and desires, and the way they shared their innermost thoughts with one another.

Instead, what I got was a whole lot show more about Gloria, and very little about Anderson. At first I was interested in Gloria’s story, but her constant whining, blaming her parents for absolutely everything that went wrong in her life, and the false modesty really got to me. Seriously, how many times can I take a gorgeous woman (with pictures sprinkled throughout the book to prove it) calling herself a “fat ugly duckling” before I toss the book across the room? (The answer is - too many.)

Ultimately, I don’t think the epistolary format suited this book. The conversations seemed stilted, and Anderson often had to chime in to fill in some of the gaps in his mother’s story. Also, she was very verbose while he only got a line in here and there. And it seemed to me as though she ignored him and his comments. He’d sometimes get vulnerable and open up about something specific (often having to do with the loss of his father), and Gloria would gloss over it and go back to her poor-me tales.

Gloria herself came across as petulant, selfish, and completely unable to take responsibility for her actions even at the age of 91. Everything that went wrong in her life was always someone else’s fault: her father’s for dying, her mother’s for not loving her, her aunt’s for letting her go chaperone-free to Europe at 17, etc, etc. Ugh. So disappointing. show less

In Vanderbilt: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty, Anderson Cooper and Katherine Howe track the history of this famous family from Reconstruction to the Gilded Age, from the Roaring Twenties through the Atomic Age, finally culminating in Cooper’s own mother, Gloria Laura Vanderbilt. Cooper and Howe write, “The Vanderbilt story somehow manages to be both unique and also, deeply, universally American. It is a saga of wealth and success and individualism, but as it turns out, those show more aren’t necessarily the universal goods our culture likes to believe they are.” It is, in their terms, “The story of the greatest American fortune ever squandered.” They begin at the end, with Cornelius Vanderbilt’s death and the eviction of his great-great-great-granddaughter Gladys from the family’s Rhode Island home, the Breakers, in 2018. Cooper and Howe then move through history from the first van der Bilt in New Amsterdam to Cornelius’ early success in cornering the ferry market in New York Harbor and his railroad empire. Where Cornelius built a fortune and his eldest surviving son William Henry expanded it, subsequent generations slowly let it slip away. William’s son, named for himself, married Alva Erskine Smith, who succeed in breaking into New York society and supplanting the Astors, though her need for control led to her domineering her daughter Consuelo, arranging Consuelo’s marriage into the British aristocracy, even as her own marriage collapsed. For her part, Alva eventually married Oliver Belmont and became a champion of women’s rights. Willie’s brother Corneil fathered the children that eventually led both to Gladys and to Anderson Cooper himself. Vanderbilt is part Cooper’s reckoning with his family’s messy history, part a story as old as America itself. The Vanderbilts were seen as “new money” by the Astors, even though the van der Bilt family preceded the Astor family in the Americas. A country without a hereditary peerage, America’s wealthy first command power before refining themselves into a mimicry of European aristocracy, but that power and privilege brings with it all the pains one expects while these families slowly implode under the weight of their expectations. Cooper concludes with thoughts of his own son. He writes, “He is not a scion or an heir. He is, and will be, his own person. He will make his own way. Forge his own path. And perhaps, one day, he will read this book and understand.” The Vanderbilt legacy is a tempting one, but one that was built on ruthless capitalism and squandered just the same. show less

In this unusual dual memoir, Anderson Cooper and his mother Gloria Vanderbilt share a series of emails they wrote back and forth to one another over the course of a year. The "project" began after Vanderbilt suffered a bout of illness in her 90s and Cooper thought it was high time that he learned all he wanted to know about his mother, especially things about her early life.

This book was recommended to me by a co-worker, but I honestly wasn't that hyped to jump on the bandwagon. But I was show more looking for a next audiobook to read, and I saw this while browsing and decided it would be good to finally follow up on that recommendation. I was blown away by how interested I was in this book. I knew little about Vanderbilt's celebrated life beyond that she was born into an enormously wealthy family and that she designed jeans. The story of her tumultuous upbringing, including the infamous child custody case in which her mother and her aunt fought over her, were new to me and heartbreaking. Her teen-aged and adult years flitting around from marriage to marriage and hobnobbing at one celebrity outing or another were interesting to hear about, although also unsettling in their own way. Further misfortune plagued her when her husband Wyatt Cooper died at a young age and her son Carter Cooper committed suicide. But throughout it all, she remains ever hopeful about the future, despite being plagued by insecurities, fears, and doubts.

Cooper for his part mostly asks questions of his mother; his reporter's tenacity digs deeper into certain topics to find out more or get to the root of a story. He also provides some context for the reader regarding some of his mother's comments, filling in blanks about her family history with a "just the facts" type approach. But he also discusses his own thoughts and feelings about growing up as Vanderbilt's son, regrets about his brother's suicide, and grief over his father's death when he himself was only aged 10.

Listening to the audiobook for this book was a particular treat. Both authors read their parts aloud, so that a clear and distinct voice separates each section. Cooper's voice is not exactly monotone but he reads in that sort of bland, affect-less news anchor's voice. An entire book in this fashion might have been too much, but being as he alternates with his mother, it works out okay. On the other hand, Vanderbilt pours so much emotion into her reading! Even when speaking about events that happened 80 years ago, her voice trembles at sad points and leaps for joy when discussing moments of elation. It was such a moving reading that you can't help but be riveted. show less

Cooper is a remarkably sensitive and engaging writer. This history of the ultra-rich Vanderbilt family is structured as a collection of episodes, much like a short story collection built around a theme. And as with such a collection, some of the "stories" are more resonant than others. I particularly enjoyed chapter 4, which is a virtual skeleton key to television's The Gilded Age, and chapter 11, about the social downfall of Truman Capote. But all the chapters are interesting, and together, show more like all great portraits of great American families, they say some important things about our country and how it became what it is. show less