Space Between the Stars: My Journey to an Open Heart
by Deborah Santana
Published by Published by A One World Book, Random House Publishing Group
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Reviewed by Laura Langer
This isn't your ordinary "wife-of-celebrity memoir." Deborah King Santana is the daughter of an Irish-English professional woman and an African-American jazz musician, brought up in a sheltered, secure life, with pride in herself and her heritage. Her adult life will be neither sheltered nor secure—and never ordinary.
Deborah meets Sly Stone as a teenager. She is totally unprepared for his world, but is so charmed and seduced by him, that she enters it, complete with music, drugs, abuse, and shame. When she finally finds the strength to leave him, she soon meets Carlos Santana, already a Grammy-winning rock superstar, and though she tells herself to wait, immediately begins a relationship with him.
Over three decades as Santana's wife, she'll experience the world of a touring musician, a meditative life with an oppressive guru, unfaithfulness by Santana, three children, near financial ruin, and the exhilaration of starting a successful business. Most important, she discovers the emergence of a sense of herself, and what it means to be true to that self.
Santana unfolds her story without judgment of the person who made the decisions she did. Santana the writer allows Deborah's understanding of each part of her life to emerge slowly and naturally. As much as is possible when looking back over time, we get a sense of what she felt and experienced as it happened, and then what she did with it.
Her writing is sensual—the feel of skin, the sense of light, music's blood-level rhythm describe her life intimately. It is also sensible—she looks back on her life not as isolated incidents adding up to something, but as stages of becoming. She describes herself with honesty, and fills the page with adjectives and adverbs, leaving nothing to chance in how we will understand her world. It's not a celebrity memoir at all, but a deep look at what this woman, who happens to be married to a famous man, is made of.
Armchair Interviews says this is an excellent read if you want to learn what is like to be part of a famous musician's life—with all its perks and pitfalls.