June 10, 1950. Twelve-year-old Tony Ray leaves behind his single mother and their drab Manhattan apartment and flies to Los Angeles, to stay at the sun-drenched Malibu beach house of his remote father, acclaimed Hollywood director Nicholas Ray, and movie-star stepmother, Gloria Grahame. So begins this poignant coming-of-age memoir, written with uncommon insight, sensitivity and clarity.
In 1958, at the age of 21, Tony set down his recollections of his transformative few months in California, a time when he desperately yearned for his father's affection while, at the same time, Grahame was opening up a world as alluring for an adolescent as it was bewildering. Nicholas Ray biographer Patrick McGilligan notes in his introduction that the book is "a lost grail, which recalls with agonizing honesty the messy three-way entanglement whose repercussions undoubtedly contributed not only to Nicholas Ray's, but also Tony's and Grahame's, lifetime of hurt."
Through the wide eyes of youth, Tony captures the thrill of Hollywood glamour and the ache of emotional abandonment. Circle of Lions is a quietly devastating meditation on adolescence, fractured families, and the unrelenting need for connection. In her Foreword, Tony's daughter Kelsey reflects on the meaning behind the book's title, describing it as a symbol of "the impacts of generational trauma that goes untended. One vicious lion begets another until someone is brave enough to break the cycle." This memoir is that act of courage: one young man's attempt to see the adults closest to him clearly, and so begin to understand himself.