Presley’s secret love

Press, 23 January 1988, Page 25

Presley’s secret love

Are You Lonesome Tonight? By Lucy de Barbin and Dary Mafera. Century Hutchinson, 1987. 294 pp. $34.95. (Reviewed by Carol Smith) On a cool night in Memphis, high on a grassy hilltop, Elvis Presley fell in love with a beautiful girl of French descent.

This book is her story — of a secret love that endured 2*4 years even though the two involved saw little of each other.

Lucy De Barbin’s life with Elvis took two years to recount to Matera as she had kept it inside so long. He believed, after thoroughly checking every detail he could, that a fraud would not know the intimate details about Elvis that Lucy revealed. And despite the anguish, tears, and long hours of work, she never asked for a dime. Lucy’s only motivation for approaching Matera to write a book was that it was a way to tell her daughter Desiree — fathered by Elvis — about the man she never knew.

When Elvis and Lucy met in 1953, Lucy was 16. At the age of 11 she was auctioned by her mother for marriage to the highest bidder, to a man much

older who would beat and rape her for years to come. At 12 she had her first child.

Lucy says Elvis wanted to free her from the marriage, but she made him keep their love a secret as she did not want his chances of being famous ruined by a scandal. She later hid her daughter from him. During their relationship, Elvis and Lucy met in parks and hotel rooms across the United States. When Elvis married Priscilla he told Lucy it was because he was lonely as she would not marry him and that Priscilla looked like her.

He made Priscilla dye her hair the same colour as Lucy’s, dress like her, and take French lessons because he loved Lucy to talk in French. None of Elvis’ friends had ever known why he had such a passion for the language. Towards the end of Elvis’ life Lucy was a constant comfort to him, but was unable to get close enough to protect him from the drugs he took and the people who controlled him. In her recording of events, Lucy has not glossed over anything. The book is a straightforward account of a tragic love and is a must for all Elvis fans.