Thing of Beauty: The Tragedy of Supermodel Gia

Hats off to author Stephen Fried, who has undertaken what may be the most exhaustive investigative reporting effort to produce a biography that essentially covered a little more than a decade. The story of the late supermodel Gia Carangi is known by many, but only on the surface. "Thing of Beauty" captures the essence of how a beautiful, but wayward persona can self-destruct when mixed with the capricious intensity of the... Read Full Review

I seen the movie with Angela Jolie and that's when prompted me to buy the book. At first the book was a little hard for me to get into, but after a while I couldn't put it down. First of all I had to keep in mind that this was a very tragic story about a very said young lady. My heart went out to her. Modeling didn't cause Gia's problems, her problems were already there long before she went to New York. The modeling... Read Full Review

This isn't the story of Gia's life whereas she never had much of a life...she was used as a doll to vicariously live through by her mother, she used others to fulfill the love she so desperately craved-and couldn't give herself-and was used by an industry that cared less if it's workers lived/died/whatever, as evidenced by the (non)reactions to her death. Gia deserved better than this, we all do, it's a pity that people (mentioned... Read Full Review

Stephen Fried wonderfuly captures the life and times of the girl who was responsible for the word Supermodel. Fried takes us on a fantastic journey which was Gia's life. His brand of tell it like it is journalism is refreshing. His portrayal of Gia's Joan Crawfordish mother Kathleen is extremely eye-opening. This is not the same Kathleen which was featured in the movie GIA. Instead we see Kathleen as she is self-centered,... Read Full Review

After I saw the HBO movie "Gia" I found myself yearning to know more about this woman's life. "Thing of Beauty" not only presents the real and compelling story of Gia from her troubled upper middle class adolescence in suburban Phillie to her rise as the "first supermodel" to her downfall to heroin, which led to her untimely death from AIDS, but is also a great historical/pop culture account of the late '70s and early... Read Full Review