Reasoner on Relationships

Here’s something I’ll bet you didn’t know: Harry Reasoner (1923-1991), the Iowa native who spent many years as a television reporter and news anchor for the ABC and CBS networks, penned several non-fiction books (including 1966’s The Reasoner Report and 1981’s Before the Colors Fade) … but only a single novel.

A partly autobiographical work originally published in 1946, it was titled Tell Me About Women. According to Pulp International, “Reasoner described the book”--about a noticeably fading marriage--“as warmly received, but joked about its poor sales, and after a time admitted he cringed over the prose, perhaps because he never really knew anything about women until he fathered five daughters.” Regardless, the 1950 Dell edition of Tell Me About Women boasted a smart-looking cover by Harry Barton.