Ginny Good

by Gerard Jones

". . . captures the spirit of the San Francisco Bay area in the 1960's and 1970's and tells the story of Jones' life as Ginny ("the first hippie") drifts into and out of it."- Publishers Marketplace in their "Deal of the Day" column. "A soothingly disturbing bittersweet elixir. By turns deliciously funny and poignantly painful, it wanders and rambles in and out of the messiness of life. It's real. It's human. You will be different for having immersed yourself in it. Ginny Good has the soul and guts and truth of a classic of American Literature."-Donna McDougle, author and book reviewer Gerard Jones is the infamous creator of the Everyone Who's Anyone in Trade Publishing website.

350 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

Gerard Jones is an award-winning American author and comic book writer. From 1987 to 2001, Jones wrote many comic books for Marvel Comics, DC Comics, Dark Horse Comics, Viz Media, Malibu Comics and other publishers; including Green Lantern, Justice League, Prime, Ultraforce, El Diablo, Wonder Man, Martian Manhunter, Elongated Man, The Shadow, Pokémon, and Batman.

Jones is author of the Eisner Award-winning Men of Tomorrow: Geeks, Gangsters, and the Birth of the Comic Book (2004); Killing Monsters: Why Children Need Fantasy, Superheroes and Make-Believe Violence (2002), and Honey I'm Home: Sitcoms Selling the American Dream (1993). Jones is co-author with Will Jacobs of The Beaver Papers (1983), The Comic Book Heroes (1985, 1996), and the comic book The Trouble with Girls (1987-1993). From 1983 to 1988, Jacobs and Jones were contributors to National Lampoon magazine. He and Jacobs began writing humorous fiction again in 2008 with the online series My Pal Splendid Man and Million Dollar Ideas

Reviews

[Asghar Abbas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good enough and entertaining.

What's interesting about this is how this book got published than what the content is.

Worth a read.

A Man knows he can do it.

A Man knows they won't let him.

A Man does it anyway

in his own way.

ON HIS OWN

Hope the Man does it again.

Yep, this is still warm.

[Carolyn Agosta · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well, it is a pretty fascinating book. Really strong first-person voice, loved the opening. The story gets sadder as it goes on, not a happy-ending kind of thing, but a fascinating look at a specific time and some pretty specific places. Very ALIVE all the way through. Really enjoyed it.

[Amandra · Rating 2 out of 5]

Just not for me the author/narrator of this book got on my nerves

[Tom Schulte · Rating 2 out of 5]

I read about this book on the Manson Blog. Manson has said, "Where does the garbage go? As we have tins and garbage alongside the road, and oil slicks in the water, so you have people, and I am one of your garbage people." Part of my interest there is me is why and how a conglomeration of discarded people became this family of garbage people. I thought this book ostensibly a biography of Virginia "Ginny" Good, the older sister of Sandra Good would have such info. Also, the story starts close to home for me in Royal Oak, MI.

Well, all about the Manson bit can be gleaned from this quote:

here's part of that letter I mentioned earlier, the one that talks about some of Sandy's "adventures" with the so-called Manson Family:


"Sandy is a total hippie who was living with the Beach Boys in Malibu and now is with prospectors in the desert teaching Dean Martin's daughter how to lose her ego. They cluck their tongues about what bad shape Mia Farrow and Nanci Sinatra's heads are in, altho Miss Farrow gave away her clothes and is living ascetically, 'she just can't give up her image.' I would certainly like to see my sister after reading her letters. She hikes barefoot in the desert forever, and she used to deride my mystical propensities. She is an Aquarian—Pisces cusp—which goes right along with what she is now doing. An absolutely rebellious, unconventional mystic. I sort of envy her."


All I personally remember about Sandy is that she used to work as a sales clerk at the Emporium on Market Street. She sold scarves and plastic headbands and was a lot less charismatic than Ginny—less compelling, more drab. That was before she shaved herself bald, carved a swastika into her forehead and hung out with the rest of the Manson chicks chanting spooky stuff outside the Hall of Justice in L.A., and way before she and Squeaky set up their own website.

More name-dropping comes from the dating and frolicking with Donna McKechnie who, along with Melanie completes a long, drawn-out lover's triangle that includes Ginny. As the introduction states, "...basically, the book’s about four people—Elliot Felton, Virginia Good, Melanie and me—and
what we all tried to do with each other..." As such, the author mostly focuses on sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll. The audiobook is heavily seasoned with song and spoken word samples to festoon a journey that documents the birth and death of the hippie lifestyle. Ginny is the prototype hippie, Melanie the dark side of peace & love through heroin addiction and Elliot is the damaged Vietnam vet. Jones is not out to document history. This is largely a personal memoir delivered with a I-don't-care-what-you-think attitude.

[Nikki · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gerard Jones has great style, easy to read and very witty. A few parts dragged for me, but overall, I enjoyed it.