Say Everything
A Memoir
Published on 13. March 2025
Book
Hardback
304 pages
978-0-00-866111-3 (ISBN)
Description
Gen X icon Ione Skye bares all in an achingly vulnerable coming-of-age memoir about chasing fame, desire, and true love in the shadow of her famous, absent father.
"Yep, Ione Skye wrote a memoir. I gobbled it up." - MIRANDA JULY
In 1987, sixteen-year-old Ione Skye landed the breakout role of Diane Court, the dream girl who inspires John Cusack's iconic boombox serenade in the hit Cameron Crowe film, Say Anything. While Skye seemed perfectly typecast as an aloof valedictorian, she was anything but.
Deserted by her dad, the folk singer legend Donovan, Skye was a ninth-grade dropout who sought solace and validation in the eyes of audiences and dreamy costars like Keanu Reeves, River Phoenix, Matthew Perry, John Cusack, and Robert Downey Jr. But like her sixties It Girl mom, Skye's greatest weakness was musicians.
On the heels of a toxic relationship with the Red Hot Chili Peppers' Anthony Kiedis, which began when she was just sixteen and he was twenty-four, the actress leapt into wedded bliss with her first great love, Beastie Boy Adam Horovitz.
But marriage was not the magical hall pass to adulthood Skye had imagined. Awakening to her bisexuality and desperately insecure, she risked her fairytale marriage for a string of affairs with gorgeous nineties "bad girls." The dream marriage imploded, and Skye's trust in herself and her future along with it.
Set against a backdrop of rock royalty compounds, supermodel cliques, and classic late-century films like River's Edge, Gas Food Lodging, and Wayne's World, Say Everything is a wild ride of Hollywood thrills as well as a lyrical reflection on ambition, intimacy, and a messy, sexy, unconventional life.
"Yep, Ione Skye wrote a memoir. I gobbled it up." - MIRANDA JULY
In 1987, sixteen-year-old Ione Skye landed the breakout role of Diane Court, the dream girl who inspires John Cusack's iconic boombox serenade in the hit Cameron Crowe film, Say Anything. While Skye seemed perfectly typecast as an aloof valedictorian, she was anything but.
Deserted by her dad, the folk singer legend Donovan, Skye was a ninth-grade dropout who sought solace and validation in the eyes of audiences and dreamy costars like Keanu Reeves, River Phoenix, Matthew Perry, John Cusack, and Robert Downey Jr. But like her sixties It Girl mom, Skye's greatest weakness was musicians.
On the heels of a toxic relationship with the Red Hot Chili Peppers' Anthony Kiedis, which began when she was just sixteen and he was twenty-four, the actress leapt into wedded bliss with her first great love, Beastie Boy Adam Horovitz.
But marriage was not the magical hall pass to adulthood Skye had imagined. Awakening to her bisexuality and desperately insecure, she risked her fairytale marriage for a string of affairs with gorgeous nineties "bad girls." The dream marriage imploded, and Skye's trust in herself and her future along with it.
Set against a backdrop of rock royalty compounds, supermodel cliques, and classic late-century films like River's Edge, Gas Food Lodging, and Wayne's World, Say Everything is a wild ride of Hollywood thrills as well as a lyrical reflection on ambition, intimacy, and a messy, sexy, unconventional life.
Reviews / Votes
"Yep, Ione Skye wrote a memoir. I gobbled it up. She's just really honest and detailed and heartfelt which really only works if you have heart, and she so obviously does. You want to know her, hang out with her, cuddle with her in a way that maybe leads to more, even if the relationship ultimately is more like sisters (this kind thing happens a lot with all the people you would love to be brothers and sisters with, following hooking up.) The biggest shocker (for me) was JUST how bisexual she is" - MIRANDA JULY"Deeply personal, riveting, and funny, Ione has created an emotional diary that feels like a song you never want to end. As an actor and as a writer, her honesty is unforgettable." -CAMERON CROWE
"Ione Skye's unflinching memoir embodies the grit of Eve Babitz mixed with the enchanting guilelessness of Alice navigating her way through the most illogical wonderlands of them all: Hollywood. Ione tells her story of grappling with primal abandonment, love and heartbreak with compassionate candor and a true visual artist's recall of detail. As the title states, she really does say everything and left me wanting even more." -MOLLY RINGWALD
"Always charming and witty, Ione was in the center of my nineties LA." -SOFIA COPPOLA
"Ione Skye has always been a bit of a mystery; beautiful, elegant, and artistically accomplished in various realms of the arts. It was a pleasure to read her engaging book." -CRISPIN GLOVER
"Ione Skye captivated an entire generation as a new kind of ingenue-idiosyncratic, almost vulpine, and a fascinating fixture of LA lure. But this book proves that even though she was on everyone's screen (and wall) she had more to say than anyone else's work could contain. And that the most fascinating, funny and ferocious version of events was her own." -LENA DUNHAM
"I raced through it in two sittings ...unusually upfront and racy. The writing is so good... as much a tapestry of the era as it is a story about Ione Skye."-BRET EASTON ELLIS
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
HarperCollins Publishers
Illustrations
62 col plates (16pp)
Dimensions
Height: 238 mm
Width: 155 mm
Thickness: 32 mm
Weight
540 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-00-866111-3 (9780008661113)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Person
Ione Skye made her film debut opposite Keanu Reeves in River's Edge, followed by her iconic role as Diane Court in Say Anything. She has appeared in other notable films and television projects including Zodiac, Wayne's World, Fever Pitch, Arrested Development, Camping, Good Girls, Beef, and many more. Skye is also a painter who has exhibited and sold her work for twenty-five years. She is the author of the children's book, My Yiddish Vacation, and cohost of the weekly podcast Weirder Together. A mother of two daughters, she lives in Los Angeles with he collaborator and husband, the musician Ben Lee.