Madonna Like an Icon

As a Madonna fan, I read J. Randy Taraborrelli's Madonna: An Intimate Biography and loved it. Sensational, trashy and in bite size pieces, I devoured chapters at a time.

O'Brien's biography of Madonna is completely different to Taraborrelli's. Her work seems more academic in it's written style, and as a former university student this is apparent when you read that O'Brien is an academic herself. And the opening chapters tell us of her own personal fascination with Madonna as opposed to Taraborrelli's journalistic endeavours.

The biography itself charters Madonna's life up to present times, from her beginnings to the then settled adoption saga of David Banda. If you're a Madonna fan this will all be pretty familiar.

A biographer should not be afraid to critique their subject and this aspect is what made the book for me. O'Brien took a step back from the fly on the wall documentation used by Taraborrelli and psychoanalysed and critiqued Madonna, what made her the person she is now, and possibly where she is going next.

A thoroughly modern and mature read about Madonna.