Queen of Ice, Queen of Shadows

The naive American public knew her as a blonde bundle of energy who won Olympic gold medals and world figureskating championships and whose first film for Darryl Zanuck established her as a top box-office attraction. The Norwegian papers called her "pro-Nazi" and a "female Quisling." She called Adolf Hitler "my dear friend." Only those closest to her saw the Sonja possessed by an insatiable passion for money, diamonds, furs, and men. Lawsuits and hysterical attacks against her family were brought on by alcoholic binges; friends and business associates were spied upon, abused, and alienated; at her second divorce she staged a midnight raid with a moving van on the posh estate she had occupied with her husband -- she stripped it bare, taking even the toilet tissue. Sonja took dozens of lovers, from among Hollywood's biggest stars and lowliest extras, and three husbands, but there was only one man she ever loved, Tyrone Power. When she died of leukemia in 1969, her multi-million-dollar fortune was intact, but she had disinherited her blood relatives, left her faithful secretary of twenty-six years with nothing, and had left instructions that her jewelry be permanently displayed as if they were the Crown Jewels of England. This book could have been called Sonja Dearest.