"Including interviews with hundreds who knew Lee, ...music journalist James Gavin offers the most revealing look yet at an artist of infinite contradictions and layers. Lee was a North Dakota prairie girl who became a temptress of enduring mystique. She was a singer-songwriter before the term existed. 'Lee had incredible confidence onstage, ' observed the Godfather of Punk, Iggy Pop; yet inner turmoil wracked her. She spun a romantic nirvana in her songs, but couldn't sustain one in reality; as she passed middle age, Lee dwelled increasingly in a bizarre dreamland"--Amazon.com.