Another City, Not My Own
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 First edition cover | |
| Author | Dominick Dunne |
|---|---|
| Cover artist | Julie Metz Warren Bernard |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Fiction |
| Publisher | Crown Publishers |
Publication date | 1997 |
| Publication place | United States |
| Pages | 360 |
| ISBN | 0-609-60100-8 |
| OCLC | 37546902 |
| 813/.54 21 | |
| LC Class | PS3554.U492 A8 1997b |
Another City, Not My Own is a 1997 novel by Dominick Dunne. The roman à clef, subtitled A Novel in the Form of a Memoir, was inspired by Dunne's experiences in Los Angeles while covering the O.J. Simpson murder trial for Vanity Fair.
The hardcover edition (ISBN 0-609-60100-8) was released by Crown Publishers. The paperback (ISBN 0-517-3613-96) was published by Random House in February 1999.
Protagonist Gus Bailey, introduced in Dunne's earlier novel People Like Us, is a successful writer who is assigned to cover the Simpson trial for Vanity Fair. He firmly believes Simpson is guilty from the very beginning, and in his monthly column Letter from Los Angeles, he clearly states his position and puts his personal spin on what he observes in the courtroom and beyond. Those involved with the criminal proceedings, including Marcia Clark and Christopher Darden for the prosecution, Johnnie Cochran, F. Lee Bailey, Robert Kardashian, Barry Scheck, and Robert Shapiro for the defense, and Judge Lance Ito, all figure prominently in the story.
Bailey becomes the darling of Hollywood society, all of whom are eager to include him as a guest at their dinner parties so he can regale everyone with inside tidbits and juicy gossip. Celebrities such as Elizabeth Taylor, Kirk Douglas, Warren Beatty, Jack Nicholson, David Geffen, Roddy McDowall, and June Anderson, social types like Nancy Reagan, Betsy Bloomingdale, and Nan Kempner, royalty such as Princess Diana, Princess Margaret, and Queen Noor of Jordan, and television personalities like Harvey Levin and Larry King make appearances in the book.
Background
Bailey clearly is the author's alter ego. Like his creator, Bailey is a one-time film producer whose Hollywood career was derailed by alcoholism and other addictions. His daughter was murdered by her ex-boyfriend, and the killer's subsequent sentencing to only a few years in prison inspired him to become an advocate for battered women and seek justice for the underdog. For Vanity Fair, he covered the trials of Claus von Bülow, William Kennedy Smith, Michael Skakel, and the Menéndez brothers, and he authored the books The Winners, The Two Mrs. Grenvilles, People Like Us, An Inconvenient Woman, and A Season in Purgatory, all titles by Dunne. His son, a one-time actor who appeared in An American Werewolf in London, is now a successful film director, his ex-wife is suffering with multiple sclerosis, and for several days his son Alexander is missing in the Arizona desert. All of this mirrors Dunne's life.
