1. I Walked The Line: My Life with Johnny
    Vivian Cash, Ann Sharpsteen
    Scribner / 2008 / Trade Paperback
    Our Price$20.10 Retail Price$21.99 Save 9% ($1.89)
    2.0 out of 5 stars for I Walked The Line: My Life with Johnny. View reviews of this product. 1 Reviews
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  1. CountryMusicGeek
    2 Stars Out Of 5
    Sad And Too Full of Bitterness
    October 12, 2023
    CountryMusicGeek
    Quality: 1
    Value: 3
    Meets Expectations: 1
    This book written with the letters of Johnny and the memories of Vivian Liberto could have been very beautifully bittersweet if Mrs Vivian Liberto had decided to walk in forgiveness like she claims to.

    A large majority of the book is the Love letters from Johnny Cash to his first wife Vivian liberto, and they are beautiful for the romance lover. I am not someone who enjoys reading other people's love letters so I skipped the majority of them.

    My principal complaint with Vivian's book is when she is finally given the chance to speak for herself, she chooses to spend the majority of her time describing a supposedly perfect marriage with Johnny Cash (we live in a fallen world. a perfect marriage is not possible) and then proceeds to blame drugs and June Carter for taking Johnny away from her. Now, it could be that June did pursue Johnny, I don't know all of the dark secrets of Johnny and June's affair. However, a Christian should be bothered that Vivian Liberto refuses to acknowledge Johnny's sinful nature. No matter how good of a husband he was, that alone would have led him to fall into sin apart from drugs. Johnny Cash was also a fairly honest man and admitted that though he did change from the drug use, he loved the fast lifestyle of the music industry, and he loved attention from women and June was not the only affair.

    I do feel compassion for Mrs Liberto, she was betrayed and mistreated to a great degree. She didn't deserve the humiliation she went through, and the overwhelming craze of the media and the attention from fans. No one in that time period could have been ready for that. Coupled with the loneliness, the isolation of being in California friendless, taking care of the kids and pets, it is no wonder that Vivian seems quite traumatized still speaking about the experiences all these years later.

    But it is wrong of her to blame it all on June and then proceed to belittle June from her talent act, to her personality, to her financial worth. Vivian claims ultimately to forgive June but her criticism of June, very angry and Petty in nature, does not reflect this forgiveness. Yes, you are allowed to speak of how someone has hurt you, but she condemns June and that is against the Forgiveness Jesus taught. It is very disappointing that Vivian Liberto, a devout Catholic, did not remember or practice this.

    Beyond her bitterness at June, there is a concerning amount of idolatry that Vivian displays towards her ex-husband Johnny Cash. As mentioned, she cannot accept his sinful nature, and insists on believing to the end that if she had fought harder for her marriage or if June and drugs had never entered the picture, she and Cash would have remained married.

    Very understandable and rightful that she believed in saving marriages, but even Christian should be willing to accept it if a partner wants to leave. Perhaps in her church they did not teach that Christians are still able to sin. I have heard some interviews with Johnny Cash and there came a point when he did not want to salvage his marriage. I happen to think this is one of the few cases where the divorce was in the best interest of both.

    Vivian Liberto clearly was a sweet, devoted wife who deserved better than what she got. But she should not have written this book in my opinion. It just seems her ultimate goal was to get revenge on June Carter and tell the whole world Johnny Cash could not have truly loved June, and that every word he said was a lie.

    I'm sorry, but it does not sit right with me that an ex-wife is trying to tell us what Johnny Cash's life was really like. She can only speak for herself, she cannot speak for him. For those reasons, I think this book should be avoided.

    I pray that Vivian Liberto found God's peace.

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