5. (Carol has a new job, and she and George have lost touch for several months. The following is probably one of the most bizarre telephone conversations ever
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There are pics of Carol at George's Esher house, the normal pics the fans took of one another, he's in some posing with them too. None of him at her bedsit though. Once the Scruffs got close to the Beatle of their choice, it was considered amateurish to want to keep taking pics of them, like any visiting tourist. By then they felt they knew their Beatle on a deeper level and didn't have to keep bothering them with requests for pictures. There are two letters Carol reproduces, the last George wrote to thank her after she wrote him saying she liked Extra Texture. But the letter the other Scruffs felt betrayed George's trust was one which began "Dear Carol, Kathy and Lucy" and he thanks them for being all there during the making of All These Must Pass, how he was overwhelmed by their love even though he didn't understand why they loved him, and he ended the letter with "Please don't use this against me" and when Carol wrote the book, and included the letter, the others (and George, no doubt) felt she had betrayed that trust. Even if the conversations are too long to be remembered verbatim, this book gave a rare multi-faceted glimpse into who George was; not many Beatles books do that. The only others I can think of are Bramwell's, O'Dells, the book about George in Benton and the book written by the President of his American Fan Club. Ken Mansfield's book is pretty good too. A lot of books make him so one-dimensional, and George was anything but that. If anything, he could be a very confusing person.
Oh, and the part about the gap between her and George's religious fanaticism was so much greater than the gap between fan and pop star was perceptive, I thought. As was the part where she tried to urge him to try moderation in his pursuits. I'm not sure how much of the account was embellished or how much poetic license was used for effect, but she seemed quite a level-headed, self-possessed person.
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