Raised in Los Angeles, Carla Malden began her career
working in motion picture production and development before
becoming a screenwriter.
Along with her father, Academy Award winning actor Karl
Malden, she co-authored his critically acclaimed memoir When Do
I Start?
More recently, Malden published Afterimage: A Brokenhearted Memoir
of A Charmed Life, her own fiercely personal account of battling
the before and surviving the after of losing her first husband to
cancer. Afterimage is a journey through grief to gratitude that
alerts an entire generation: this is not your mother's
widowhood.
Carla's feature writing has appeared in the Los Angeles Times,
highlighting the marvels and foibles of Southern California and
Hollywood. She sits on the Board of the Geffen Playhouse. Search
Heartache is her first novel.
Carla Malden lives in Brentwood with her husband and ten minutes
(depending on traffic) from her daughter.
"Search Heartache is a gripping first-person story that does an
outstanding job of probing the evolution of love, change, and
choice. It reveals many mercurial points of view before coming full
circle in an unexpected and satisfying way, and will delight fans
of women's fiction and literature who will find in Maura a powerful
character whose dilemmas are at once challenging and, in an ironic
manner, fun. Whether Search Heartache is chosen as a beach read or
a more thought-provoking work of literature, it's a tale that will
linger in the mind long after its final revelations."
—Midwest Book Review
Praise for Carla Malden
“I've spent my professional life telling stories. AfterImage does
exactly that and touches us where we live. It is compelling,
moving, raw—with moments of surprising humor. I try to leave my
audiences with meaningful and enduring images from my movies.
That's exactly what Carla Malden achieves with her newest
book.”
—Michael Douglas, actor The Kominsky Method and Romancing the
Stone
“Carla Malden traces the awful journey of her young husband’s
illness and death with such precision and care, expressing the
emotion between the exhilaration of hope and the darkness of
reality so powerfully, that her eloquence turns grief into poetry
and enlightenment.”
—Blythe Danner, actress Will & Grace and Meet the Parents
“Carla Malden’s memoir about her husband and screenwriting partner
Laurence Starkman is a haunting story of love and loss, and a
demonstration of the courage required to put a broken life together
again.”
—Susan Cooper, author of The Dark is Rising
“All I can say is WOW! I read for a living [and] never has one made
me cry until I read this manuscript. Although this is a book that
will tug at your heart, it is like the tug on a fishing line when
you know you’ve got a big one. I can’t wait to share it with
others. This is more than a book, it’s a blessing for anyone who
reads it.”
—Barry Kibrick, producer and host, Between the Lines
"Emotionally raw from start to finish, the story . . . also
celebrates a rare and profound love that transcended death. A
brutally candid memoir of the ‘all-consuming and profoundly
uncomplicated’ power of grief."
—Kirkus Reviews
![]() |
Ask a Question About this Product More... |
![]() |