Norris Church Mailer, 61, Model, Author, Painter, and the Last Mrs. Norman Mailer

She met the novelist at a book-signing in Arkansas in 1975 – when he was still married to his fourth wife and having an affair with the woman who would become his fifth. As spouse no. 6, Norris stayed with Mailer and managed his career and family for nearly three decades, while doing creative work of her own and being publicly frank about her husband’s flaws.