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Ah, Jacqueline Susann! When I was a kid, I read her books, purloined from my mother's bookshelf, and devoured every juicy sentence. Forty years later I decided to re-read "Valley of the Dolls", "The Love Machine" and "Once is Not Enough" to see how they stood the test of time. Of them all, I would have to say that "Once is Not Enough" is the weakest of the trio, but still a fun read. And, of course, nowadays it is like looking at a snapshot in an old photo book from the late 60's/early 70's. To say the plot is contrived is an understatement. Ms. Susann invents a convenient 3-year accident convalescence to explain away her heroine's unfamiliarity with early 1970's culture. January Wayne is, of course, beautiful and rich. She is "hung up" on her rakish, he-man father, Mike Wayne. Mike has settled for marriage to an aging, mega-rich New York society figure, who is secretly in love with Karla, the Garbo-esque fading movie queen. Story? Not important. Moral? None that I can see. Is it still fun to read? Yes! The fashions, cocktails, customs, and hot spots of a not-so-bygone era make this a great beach read to this day. You will also find yourself combing Google to try and find out who she patterned some of her characters on. I am sorry Ms. Susann left us so young, and did not have a chance to take a whack at writing about the 80's. Jackie Collins would not have stood a chance.

This was not completely sordid like "Once Is Not Enough," and it does hold the reader's interest, but it's not particularly memorable. It's about a TV executive named Robin Stone who has woman after another fall madly in love with him and throw themselves in his bed, but he doesn't really care about any of them. The writing is better than in "Valley of the Dolls." But if you, like I, want to have some connection to the characters when you read this kind of trashy pop fiction, you may find yourself disappointed. There's some fairly believable stuff about the development of TV show and the TV industry--the storyline about a has-been low-talent vaudevillian who becomes the star of a hit variety show is good. I wouldn't read it twice.

This was a really great story by the late and great Jackie Susann and I've got to say that I enjoyed this book very much! It kept my interest all the way to the very end. It had some great characters that in my opinion may be even better than those in "Valley Of The Dolls". I found some of the characters in this story as tragic and while others were just bitter and completely cold hearted. Overall this story was just as good as "Valley" and some may say it is even better. I think what really attracts me to reading these novels is the characters in these books seem to really be over the top and usually they hit rock bottom soon or later. I would recommend this!!

DUE TO THE CONTENT OF THE ITEM REVIEWED, THIS REVIEW IS RATED PG-13/R.

Jacqueline Susann launched a genre and crowned herself queen of the wonderful bad book with "Valley of the Dolls," the first and still the best of the trashy showbiz romans a clefs. Say what you will about her fascination with the seamy underbelly of the lives of the rich and famous or her artless prose, the woman had first-hand access to the cruel machinations of the entertainment business and could tell a story that keeps the reader turning the pages. The reader roots for the characters in "Valley of the Dolls" because at the beginning of the book, they have dreams and the youth, hope and will to strive for them. If I'm in bed with the flu and there's nothing good on TV, I reread my well-worn copy of "Valley of the Dolls."

"Once Is Not Enough," written when Susann knew she had terminal cancer, is a much bleaker, dirtier book. I suppose it reflects both Susann's mood and the tawdry state of New York City in the early 1970s when the majority of the story takes place. It's about January Wayne, a beautiful, wealthy girl in her early 20s with an Electra complex and her struggle to love a man other than her father.

SPOILER ALERT

January Wayne is the only child of Mike Wayne, a charismatic Broadway and film producer. January's mother commits suicide when she is seven. January and her father become extraordinarily close (though no actual incest). It's hard to like January because she's so vapid and she's always had everything handed to her.

Mike, a serial adulterer, loses his money and marries Dee, a wealthy closet lesbian who uses her money to control everyone around her and loves Karla (no last name), a reclusive Polish World War II refugee and retired screen goddess who also has sex with and is escorted around town by Dee's nephew David, who while he obsesses about Karla keeps trying to marry January for her money, even though he and January don't have a thing to say to one another. Linda, the sex-obsessed editor of a magazine called "Gloss," hires January as some sort of writer because of the celebrity connections January has through Mike. Linda becomes January's friend and "mentor," encouraging January to engage in promiscuous sex and get "vitamin shots." The shots give the lethargic, passive January a ton of energy but are actually laced with methamphetamine. Through her work on "Gloss," January meets and finally finds love with Tom Colt, an author even older than her father, when she "cures" his impotence. Unfortunately Tom has a wife and child out in California and writing always comes first with him. Although Tom dumps January and breaks her heart, I found him the most likeable (actually the only likeable) character in the book because he knows what he is and he's honest about it. After Mike and Dee die in a plane crash and Tom dumps her, January goes to a wild orgy with a group of off-Broadway actors where she takes LSD and has an orgasm during which she screams "I love you Mike!" Then she goes out to a beach in the Hamptons where she disappears, perhaps by drowning or perhaps by UFO abduction. No, I am not kidding, it could have been a UFO abduction.

END OF SPOILERS

While generally better-written than "Valley of the Dolls" (the bizarre ending on the beach is quite atmospheric, for example) and still something of a page-turner, "Once Is Not Enough" will never become a sickbed favorite. It reflects Susann's obsessions: the father complex--she actually dedicates this book about an Electra complex to her father's memory: creepy!--drugs, show business, music of the WWII generation, plastic surgery, lesbianism and mental impairment. The sex is much more graphic than in "Valley of the Dolls," the drugs are harder, the theater is all about nudity and prurient curiosity, every character is using another character for something, and anybody who decides to get off the hamster wheel and do something worthwhile with his or her life is killed off. I don't object to sex, drugs or swearing out of hand (I gave Keith Richards' "Life" five stars), but "Once is Not Enough" is merely sordid, pointless and completely lacking in the seedy charm that made "Valley of the Dolls" a great bad book. I felt thoroughly depressed and crummy after finishing it and have already deleted it from my Kindle. Not recommended.

A severe case of arrested development, January Wayne had no suitable role models. Idolizing her absent father, she paints him as the only man she will love, failing to develop her own personality, and doing nothing without weighing daddys reaction. Not Susanns best, it sold because it has sex, orgies, drugs, a glimpse into the pathetic lives of the rich and richer. The real heroine is the character Karla. Now SHE had a real story to tell.

This type of book never goes out of style despite being over 60 years old. The main character reminds me of Don Draper from Mad Men. I never lost interest because you really never know what's going to happen next.