As It Turns Out

Thinking About Edie and Andy

By: Alice Sedgwick Wohl

Narrated by: Alice Sedgwick Wohl

We think we know Edie Sedgwick, Warhol muse, Factory superstar, icon of the 1960s, a comet who flamed out too soon.

As It Turns Out is Edie's story told from a different point of view - that of her older sister, Alice. As Edie's fame was in the ascendant, Alice was living a completely different life in Manhattan, far away from the Factory and the Chelsea scene. Then, many years later, chancing on Edie's image in a clip from Andy's film Outer and Inner Space, Alice was moved to reconsider Edie's life and try to figure out what made Edie and Andy such iconic figures whose image and collaborative work have endured for decades. How did he anticipate so much of contemporary culture? Who exactly was Edie, that she fascinated Warhol and captured the imagination of a generation?

Wohl tells Edie's story, from her privileged and isolated childhood on a California ranch to her escape first to Boston and then to Manhattan, where in 1965 she had her first fateful encounter with Warhol. As It Turns Out is a meditation on the girl behind the irresistible image, and on the culture that she and Warhol ignited. Throughout this thoughtful, truthful reappraisal of Edie's life, Alice Sedgwick Wohl tries to find a deeper answer to the question: What was the thing about Edie?

©2023 Alice Sedgwick Wohl (P)2023 Hachette Audio UK

Critic reviews

Beautiful... Wohl adds sensitive shading and texture to the group portrait of the Sedgwicks that emerged in Edie--and a spray of light (Alexandra Jacobs)

[As It Turns Out] picks apart how Andy made Edie, how Edie made Andy, and the infinity mirror of their shared identity. A great pleasure of Sedgwick Wohl's writing is that it is sisterly in the truest sense: irritated but protective, dabbed with globs of jealousy... Wohl, who has spent decades watching her sister on film, observes her as if looking through a high-powered telescope (Hillary Kelly)

Wohl's book is not a recollection or a mere revision but rather an attempt to understand the intense attention, even obsession, with Edie and Andy, and how their pairing anticipated the age of the influencer... Wohl's description is essential to her (and our) understanding of Edie--but also to understanding ourselves, as we enact this tension on social media every day (Jessica Ferri)