The Sheik and the Shadow A Memoir of Brotherly Bond, Celebrity, and Madness

"So Morey was the family megastar. I was the also-ran, even something of a clan pariah… I was convinced that at root I was worthless, and maybe crazy.""The Sheik and the Shadow: A Memoir of Brotherly Bond, Celebrity, and Madness" imparts the intertwined accounts of Bob's intense relationship with his older brother, Morey; his experience as a certified-insane patient in a then-world-renowned mental hospital (Chestnut Lodge, the setting of the book, movie, and play "I Never Promised You a Rose Garden"); and his brother's descent from extreme literary success and fame to a bizarre, reclusive end.In his mid-thirties, Morey capped his multi-millionaire business career with "The Search for Bridey Murphy," a book that sold over 6 million copies in 30 languages across 34 countries and became a movie starring an Academy Award winner. Meanwhile, Bob was labeled schizophrenic, and locked-up with a group of creatures from his most nightmarish snake-pit fantasies. Early readers have been alternately amazed, appalled, and beguiled by the account of his confinement in this macabre setting.

When Bob Bernstein was 30, his older brother, Morey, published a book later described by the New York Times as a "sensation" that created "a cultural brush fire." Meanwhile, Bob was labeled schizophrenic, and locked-up with a group of creatures from his most nightmarish snake-pit fantasies.Bob would go on to a successful career in journalism and law—working as a reporter and columnist for the Montgomery County Sentinel, graduating first in his law school class, serving as an appellate lawyer with the Tax Division in the United States Department of Justice, and working as a tenured law professor at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas.Bob's first book, "Straight Parents, Gay Children: Keeping Families Together" (De Capo Press, 1995, 2003), won the 1996 Gustavus Myers Outstanding Book Award from the Gustavus Myers Center for the Study of Bigotry and Human Rights. His other book is "Families of Value: Personal Profiles of Pioneering Lesbian and Gay Parents" (De Capo Press, 2009). His essays have appeared in scores of newspapers and magazines.