I bought "Imagine This: Growing Up With My Brother John Lennon", and I have to say, I did like it a lot. I'm always wary of these types of books, often because the people writing them are too capable of overexaggerating and stretching the truth and all that. But I liked both Julia's book and Cyn's "John" book, because once you've read them both, you can really start to appreciate John from multiple angles. Cyn's book was very much about how John was as a lover and a hard-faced young man (NOT in a spiteful way, I might add, which was very refreshing), whereas Julia's was immersed in portraying John as a bubbly, charismatic child who slowly changed over time. You can start to put the pieces together.
What I enjoyed about Julia's book was how she described her childhood and the relationships she had with people, not just John. Occasionally it became a little scattered, but in that, I enjoy how the book isn't completely "John did this and John was that and I loved John and John and John..." It put a lot of context behind him, and actually, learning about her early life and the way she lived gave you a deep and brilliantly strong background in your mind about what life was like in that era, how things were and how people felt, so that when John did appear in the story, it gave him a much larger power as a character - you felt as though you were too a child in that era, and in a way, the context put you far enough into the picture that you could almost expect what John's reaction would be to someone, or how he would act after something big occurred, and you'd be right too.
I enjoyed Julia's book more than I expected to - I picked it up because I had some spare time and I just wondered what another perspective of John would be, and it proved valuable to learning his character, and sometimes in the happier moments, quite wonderful really.
Phew! What can I say? I love John
xxx