I agree with an earlier reviewer who said that Joan Didion did not, in his opinion, "name drop" or act pretentious. Indeed! The woman was writing about her life with her husband! The people whose names she "dropped" were their friends, colleagues, etc. Who was she supposed to write about? Those were the people that she and her husband knew, and so she wrote about them! Makes sense to me.I was very saddened to hear that Joan Didion's daughter eventually died. It is hard to fathom the pain that she must have gone through - losing her husband and then her daughter. My heart goes out to her and I wish her the very best.