DIDN'T WE ALMOST HAVE IT ALL

A former Los Angeles Times music journalist reevaluates the life and work of pop star Whitney Houston (1963-2012).

For Kennedy, author of Parental Discretion Is Advised: The Rise of N.W.A and the Dawn of Gangsta Rap, Houston’s untimely demise demonstrated how “we continue to confront the psychological toll of being a Black superstar in America.” In this book, he deliberately eschews a “straightforward cradle-to-grave” biography by examining Houston in the context of her time and cultural milieu. Born in the early 1960s, when “the Black American dream was as much about surviving as it was upward mobility,” Houston had a gospel-singing mother who recognized her daughter’s gift early on and helped train the voice that would be Houston’s “ticket out of poverty.” White music executive Clive Davis later transformed her into a wholesome pop-music confection that stripped her of erotic appeal during the MTV–dominated 1980s, when singers like Janet Jackson deliberately played up their sexuality. Kennedy suggests that the pressure to conform to heterosexist norms haunted Houston, whose strict religious upbringing frowned upon the queerness she hid from public view. Considered “a sellout, an Oreo: white on the inside, Black on the outside” by some other Black artists, Houston married hip-hop bad boy Bobby Brown and began revealing an edgier artistic persona, both musically and onscreen. But private shame about her identity led Houston to follow Brown into a spiral of violence and substance abuse that irreparably damaged her career. The great strength of this book is that Kennedy—who sees Houston through the lens of the Black Lives Matter, #MeToo, and LGBTQ+ movements of the last decade—refuses to pass judgment. Instead, he seeks to understand Houston’s struggles as evidence of a woman who shouldered an enormous burden—not just as a pop icon, but as a deeply devout queer Black artist forced to inhabit an unforgiving premade identity.

Thoughtful reading for Houston fans and music historians alike.