Moviegoers worldwide have spent more than USD1.5 billion to see her movies, but her real life has been seen only in dubious tabloid glimpses until now. James Spada has gone back to Julia's parent's beginnings in Georgia to unearth fascinating facts about her dysfunctional family background, her troubled childhood, and her early dating life. He offers fresh details about all her famous movies and uncovers an intensely dedicated but deeply insecure artist. For the past six years she has delighted audiences everywhere in a series of smash hits and achieved the distinction of earning the highest per-film paycheque of any actress in history. As a person, she's grown from a skittish girl moving through volatile relationships with handsome co-stars to become an assured woman making her own bold - and often controversial - decisions about how to live her life. This unputdownable book is a lively and vivacious as the star it explores.