I just love that picture

Empty Mansions

The Mysterious Life of Huguette Clark 

and the Spending of a Great American Fortune 

by Bill Dedman

Massive biography mixed with before-and-after story to make an almost complete tale.  it couldn't be complete, as you'll know when you read the last chapter.   The subject is Huguette Clark, but you hear a lot about her father the copper king and eventual--after many failed attempts--senator; her mother, who was his second wife; her sister and the various godchildren, relatives and support workers Huguette befriended.  The "after" story deals with her will and the efforts of the family (of her father's first wife) to have it thrown out.  Despite the fact that they'd already inherited a buttload of money when the old man died.

I ate it up, every bit.  What's not to enjoy about the making and spending of a very large amount of money?  It's sad to think what lawyer's fees and inheritance taxes are going to eat up. And who knows if the unpaid gift taxes will ever get worked out.  Huguette was supposed to pay them when she gave a large sums of money to a person, but her lawyers didn't remind her of it.  Or if they did, not often enough to matter.

Toward the end, I began to wonder if the book was written by a member of the family, possibly even by someone hoping to inherit under her will.  It was pretty obvious that the story was written by someone biased in her favor.  Not in a bad way--he told both sides of the story--but seemed to dwell on "her" side.  Given the evidence, I'd have done the same thing.  It's hard to take the opposition seriously--they kept trying to claim she was mentally deficient or unstable even when the evidence showed she was clearly not.  What was their evidence?  Family rumors and millions of dollars of incentive.

And I was happy to learn that the author was not financially motivated.  He was simply telling the facts.