The unauthorized book offers a theory as to why the celebrated chef took his own life—and is drawing criticism from his close friends and family.
, by the journalist Charles Leerhsen, retraces Bourdain’s life through more than 80 interviews and files, texts and emails from Bourdain’s own phone and laptop. It’s an unauthorized attempt to make sense of Bourdain, and it’s already drawn criticism from some of the people who were closest to him.
“Every single thing he writes about relationships and interactions within our family as kids and as adults he fabricated or got totally wrong,” Christopher Bourdain, Anthony Bourdain’s brother,. However, Simon & Schuster has stood by the book, and plans to release it on October 11. In his account, Leerhsen focuses heavily on Anthony Bourdain’s relationship with Asia Argento, whom he dated for about two years. The book delves into their tumultuous, up-and-down romance, and posits it as a possible factor that contributed to Bourdain’s suicide. At the time of his death, the two were fighting and Argento had recently told Bourdain that she couldn’t stay in their relationship.
“I think at the very end, in the last days and hours, he realized what he had become,” Leerhsen told the. “I don’t respect him killing himself, but he did realize and he did ultimately know he didn’t want to be that person he had become.” Several people in Bourdain’s inner circle refused to talk with Leerhsen for the book, yet he was able to track down very personal, intimate details of the chef. It makes for the sort of gripping tell-all that readers will likely devour. Yet it also paints a picture of Bourdain that those closest to him are loathe to have displayed publicly, and that they don’t believe tells the whole story.