Jimmy & Me
By Lew Bracker
As most of us know, the late actor James Dean had a fascination with auto racing and, indeed, was on his way to race his new Porsche 500 Spyder the day he died. This book, by his friend Lew Bracker, is not about racing—although at various points in the narrative the sport is discussed and analyzed—it is about friendship.
If you can move beyond the fact that not very much of this book deals with racing, then it will be quite a rewarding read, as Bracker went places with Dean where no one ever did. In the process he reveals himself as a true friend, describing incidents that illuminate his much-dissected pal perhaps better than has ever been done before.
It’s not really a book about the motion picture industry either, as even though a wide variety of names are dropped they are done so in what I tend to call a “sky is blue” manner as just what was going on around them and how it affected them. Given all that, and despite being only words with no pictures, it proves to be an interesting read.
Available for $11.99 from publisher Fulcorte Press at www.fulcortepress.com
