Grace Kelly

Marjorie P. K. Weiser’s Grace Kelly is a biography of Grace Kelly, published in 1970 and 96 pages long according to its Google Books record. The catalog lists Weiser as the sole author, and the 1970 date makes this the earliest book about Kelly on that list.

The publisher description in the Google Books record calls its subject “the Philadelphia girl” and names three things the biography follows: her turn to acting, her Academy Award and her marriage to Prince Rainier of Monaco. The description stops at the marriage and does not mention her years as Princess of Monaco.

For fans

The 15 other books about Kelly in the catalog all carry later dates. The oldest of them is Gwen Robyns’s Princess Grace (1976, W.H. Allen), followed by Phyllida Hart-Davis’s Grace, the story of a princess (1982, Collins). Two more are dated 1984: Steven Englund’s Grace of Monaco (Doubleday) and Sarah Bradford’s Princess Grace (Panther). The list runs on to Donald Spoto’s High society: the life of Grace Kelly (2009, Harmony Books) and Jennifer O’Callaghan’s Rear Window: The Making of a Hitchcock Masterpiece in the Hollywood Golden Age (2025, Citadel). Wikipedia’s entry on Kelly gives her death as September 14, 1982, which is 12 years after the date on Weiser’s book.

The catalog files Weiser’s book as a biography, and it files nearly all the others the same way. The exception is James Spada’s Grace: The Secret Lives of a Princess (1987, Dell), which is listed as a memoir and credits Kelly alongside Spada. Howell Conant’s Grace (1992, Random House) is also filed as a biography, although Wikipedia describes it as a book of Conant’s photographs.

The Google Books record carries no review and no chapter list, so the book’s reception and its contents beyond the publisher description cannot be confirmed from it.