Brass Diva

"A thought-provoking and absorbing read, Caryl Flinn's Brass Diva brings a fresh perspective to the legend of Ethel Merman. While she was easily dismissed as an exceedingly simple broad, Ms. Flinn's research into the nuances of her life reveal the complicated person that was my grandmother. More than once I was moved to reconsider the reasons for her enduring as a source of inspiration as well as notions about her life and career that I had taken for granted. I highly recommend it."—Barbara Geary

"This book is long overdue. We've been told that Merman's reviews were glowing, but now we can read them for ourselves. Beautifully researched, this book will undoubtedly find its way into every musical theatre library. Merman has been at the center of so many apocryphal tales, it's thrilling to enter an era of serious exploration and analysis. Brass Diva starts to pull the myths apart and to put Ethel Merman in her proper historical perspective."—Klea Blackhurst, creator of Everything The Traffic Will Allow: The Songs and Sass of Ethel Merman

"It is a pleasure to read Caryl Flinn's scrupulously researched and elegantly constructed biography. Brass Diva puts all other Merman books to shame. With her exhaustive knowledge of her subject, Flinn explores the meanings of Merman's life, her shows, her songs, her fans, and most intriguingly, her subtexts."—Krin Gabbard, author of Black Magic: White Hollywood and African American Culture

"Brass Diva is a wonderful and important study of Ethel Merman's life and work, as well as a sophisticated reading of Merman herself. The scholarship is excellent, the writing is lively and engaging, and the research is detailed and absolutely new. Brass Diva will likely become the key primary resource for future Merman scholarship."—Stacy Wolf, author of A Problem Like Maria: Gender and Sexuality in the American Musical