The Essential Elvis: The Life and Legacy of the King As Revealed Through Personal History and 112 of His Most Significant Songs

Author: Samuel Roy and Tom Aspell

Publisher: Rutledge Hill Press, 1998.

“In many ways, this book is the best book ever written about Elvis”

~Gordon Stoker of the Jordanaires

In the forward to this book, Gordon Stoker continues with his quote on the cover: … “Actually, in many ways, this is the best book written about what’s important about Elvis: his music. Why do we love his music almost 50 years after he made his first records and more than 20 years after his death? Many have tried to figure out why, but Roy and Aspell have come as close as any of us are likely to get.”

Given Gordon Stoker had a long history with Elvis—meeting him in 1955 when Elvis’ career was ready to burst wide open. Stoker went on with other members of the Jordanaires to create Elvis’ extraordinary music. As a musician in that spot, he is more qualified to make that statement than journalists and authors, who have attempted to stake claim to the answer, which may never be discovered. This alone is the reason I bought the book. It soon turned into my favorite Elvis book, with the 191  pages read in one sitting. I often reference The Essential Elvis, more than not, when I listen to Elvis on my Boze, where I can hear better all that the authors intended for fans to grasp. Why?

Although The Essential Elvis lacks a table of contents, it divides the book into periods in Elvis’ life and shows how he is influenced or not, by the social culture that he in turn impacts. The book takes each song and musically dissects it for the quality of the song alone. It then comments in detail how Elvis’ style conquered the song stylistically, making it his own or not succeeding. Roy and Aspell, back up their analysis, not opinions, with creditable sources, but it is the duo’s insightful, and original analysis of what Elvis artistically brought to each song that gives the book its uniqueness and value. It is a must have for every Elvis fan.

Elvis Presley’s Graceland Gates

Author: Harold Loyd

Publisher: Jimmy Velvet Publications, 1987 (Hardcover only).

Harold Loyd was one of Elvis Presley’s first cousins, with whom he had a close relationship. In the book’s Author’s Notes, Harold gives readers a rundown of his early life: His mother and Elvis’s mother, Gladys, were sisters from a large family of five girls and two boys. Harold was born April 22, 1929, in Tupelo, Mississippi.

He was an only child, whose parents divorced when he was very young. As a result, Harold never knew his father or any of his father’s family. Harold’s mother remarried and worked for a brief time in the same garment factory as Elvis’ mother before she was severely burned in an accident and died quickly. Harold’s stepfather remarried, but since Harold and his stepmother could not get along, he rotated living with different family members.

His favorite place to crash was with his Aunt Gladys, where he could play with Elvis and his toys. Harold talks about his life of poverty due to family turmoil and lack of education during the Great Depression and its aftermath in a tone of acceptance rather than pity. Beneath it all is a family’s cheerful willingness to share what little they had with someone who had nothing with a loving and compassionate spirit.

 The 191 pages include examples of Elvis’ generosity towards Harold when he had no place to live as a child and was out of work, which was most of his life. The reader learns about Elvis’ mother’s wisdom and kindness through her conversations with Elvis. After Elvis hires Harold as a guard at the Graceland Gates, the reader will have a difficult time putting the book down. It is full of stories that run the gamut from  humorous to absurd, sad to shocking, and touching to dangerous.

People who have not been to Graceland will get an honest and realistic view of the amazing events that happened there. Harold, who goes from orphaned to homeless to unemployed much of his life, eventually finds an abundance of love from fans and visitors who engage with him at the Graceland Gates.

 Although the formatting is a distraction almost to the point of being annoying, the book’s stories never disappoint. They are so colorful and graphic that readers can almost see the anecdotes in action. Given the backstory of the Author’s Note, the stories ring true, making the book valuable to Graceland’s legacy.

Once Upon a Time: Elvis and Anita

Memoirs of My Mother

Author: Jonnita Brewer Barrett

Publisher: BrewBar Publishing, 2012.

Elvis and Anita begins with A Special Message from Anita Wood Brewer, one of Elvis’ most significant relationships. Anita explains her daughter Jonnita will be writing her memories of Elvis for her. Anita Wood’s career in show business begins with her winning a national competition at twelve-years-old. Anita, from Bells, Tennessee, has a background like Elvis’. She is a child of post-depression parents, who are “conversative, hard-working, and family-oriented.”

Only three years younger than Elvis, Anita first sees him on The Ed Sullivan Show. She is at that time playing Elvis’ records on WTJS-FM, her high school radio show. Seventeen magazine even publishes an article spotlighting the sixteen-year-old. After participating in a Miss Tennessee Pageant, the beauty lands the co-hosting gig on the Top 10 Dance Party with Wink Martindale on WHBQ-TV in Memphis. This  is where she catches the eye of Elvis Presley. He is twenty-two and filming his second movie: Anita is only nineteen and the media’s darling.

The remainder of the book is filled with stories of Elvis and Anita: how they fall in love; how they are separated by The Colonel and the Army; the beautiful bond Anita shares with the Presley family; the faithful, marriage promises Elvis makes to her; their close relationship continuing for two years after Elvis returns home from the Army; their fun times in Memphis with a host of Elvis’ friends; her long visits to Elvis’ Hollywood sets; and finally, after moving into Graceland with Elvis, she leaves him.

 Elvis and Anita is chocked full of photos documenting their deep affection for one another. Most interesting are the images of letters Elvis wrote to Anita from Germany professing his love. If you have ever wondered about this couple’s five-year relationship, this book answers all the questions from Anita’s perspective.

This memoir needs constant focus due to the separation of the lovers by the third person narration, which creates a lack of intimacy. I found distracting when Anita is called Momma and Mother. However, the book’s content overtakes that issue. Readers will sympathize with the story’s emotional conflict: Elvis tries to stay committed to the woman he loves; Anita holds on to her need for a one-women man, in one of the music icon’s most meaningful relationships.