Autobiography released in conjunction with The Journey compilation album back in 2003. While the CD is a comprehensive summary of Donna’s musical achievements, the book only skims through her career.

You’ll either like it a lot or feel disappointed. Depends what you expected in the first place. If it’s candid anecdotes — great, you’ll find these in abundance. Summer delves a lot into personal life throughout the book, from detailing her relationship history to discussing mental health problems. This may take you by surprise since her private matters hardly had presence in the gossip media.

Yet she’s had her share of traumas. As a child, Donna nearly drowned in a swimming pool. As a teenager — almost got kidnapped! She suffered violent abuse from one of her partners and was close to losing custody over her first daughter. Pressures of fame, frustration at being a prisoner of a hyper-sexual image, and even a suicide attempt — Donna opens up about it all. She even addresses that rumour which nearly ruined her career back in the 80s. And you can’t help but sympathize when she recalls some personal tragedies in later chapters.

There are over 50 rare photos spread throughout the book. Most of them were sourced from family archives and I doubt that even most dedicated fans have seen them before. There’s a reproduction of one of Donna’s paintings, and a few pages on her artistic journey which I read with delight. She also dedicated an entire chapter to her religious awakening. I found it fascinating to read, even if our spiritual beliefs don’t quite align. What struck me was that Donna comes across as a very humble, level-headed, loving person, even decades into a mega-successful career.

Discussing music, Summer is a bit inconsistent, and at times even superficial. She elaborates on some of her most known songs and albums (“Love to Love You Baby”, “Bad Girls”, “She Works Hard for the Money”), but brushes over and ignores others (“The Wanderer”, A Love Trilogy, Four Seasons of Love, Once Upon a Time, Mistaken Identity). Shockingly, there’s not a word about “Hot Stuff” — her biggest hit! “I Feel Love” deserved more attention, considering how groundbreaking it was. I also wish that she’d discussed some of her LPs as a whole, especially the storytelling concept records from the 70s.

The book ends with only a list of albums, main compilations and soundtracks she contributed to. Sure, today fans can find her discography meticulously catalogued on sites like Discogs and Wikipedia — but this wouldn’t have been the case twenty years ago. The book is a decent introduction to Donna’s music, but true fans would have known most of this information already.

Being Donna’s first and only autobiography, Ordinary Girl: The Journey is a unique record of her life told in her own words. Unfortunately, assets barely outweight the faults and the book turns out an ordinary memoir from an extraordinary journey. 🌕🌕🌕🌗🌑