Hard Candy: A True Life Story of Riches, Fame, and Heartbreak

Condos previously wrote about rich men's mistresses in Beautifully Kept, different from this memoir, which resembles a threnody, until the close. As a child, the author notes, she was the prototype for Damon Runyon's ``Little Miss Marker'' and a favorite in the sporting world of her father, fight promoter Hyman Caplin. She enjoyed a happy home life in suburban New York until her father was sent to prison, the first of many blows to the family. Both parents, plus her brother and sister, died of Hodgkin's disease. The book contains stark descriptions of many people: the author's first husband, Nick Condos, alternately charming and brutal; his ex-wife, Martha Raye; the author's relatives; and Teresa, the maid, who sacrificed her own family to care for the Caplin children. Condos records bouts with drugs, suicide attempts, disastrous affairs and a failed second marriage. But we part her company on an upbeat note as an assertive-sounding author flies to Italy on a visit: `` `Barbara Caplin,' I hear myself say, `Hymie's daughter.' '' (July)