Why is your book titled “My Life as a Blonde?”
“The title was suggested by my friend and colleague, Chucho Gallegos, editor of TV Novelas in Mexico, during a trip in which we both coincided in Los Angeles.  He told me: Call it ‘My life as a Blonde’ but don’t tell all.  Needless to say, I did.

How does a biography get written? And whose idea was it?
“Warner Books asked us to do the autobiography, and I had so much work that my husband Marc sold me the idea very carefully, since he thought that the time was really ripe to publish it.  It took us three years to finish it.  It would have been much easier for me to go ahead and sit down at the computer and write it, but I couldn’t because I just didn’t have the time.  So I called Diana Montane, a colleague and old friend, and I started to narrate to her my entire life on tapes: all the anecdotes, all the family history, all the funny stories.  We compiled about seven or eight drafts before we even began to edit the book.  Then I realized that Diana alone was not enough.  We had to start digging in the morgues of all the magazines where I had worked, and there was such an overwhelming amount of material that I then called Luz Maria Doria, the editor of Cristina the Magazine, and I said to her: ‘Luz Maria, you have to give me a hand here.’  Then Diana and Luz Maria would each fax me a draft, I would go over them, and afterwards we would get together and edit like crazy until we finally finished.

Were there any funny or interesting anecdotes from that time?
“I like to call this bio the ‘hormonal’ book. When we started to write it with Diana it was very curious, because we were both beginning to go through menopause.  We had the same exact symptoms, the craziness, the dizziness, the hot flashes...For instance, I would stop in the middle of a conversation and say to her: ‘What the hell were we talking about?’ And she’d look at me blankly and answer: ‘Hell if I know...”  When Luz Maria joined us, she was 29 and pregnant with Dominique, her first child.  What can I tell you... Towards the final months of her gestation, she got an incontrollable rash all over her body, caused by the hormonal imbalance of the pregnancy, and she had to take oatmeal baths, which was the only thing that calmed it.  So she’d get in her bathtub up to her neck, wait for the itching to subside, run out of the house and and come to my house to meet the two menopausal women to write and edit the ‘hormonal’ book which became ‘My life as a Blonde.”  To me it seemed incredible that the book was the hormonal climax of three professional women.”

How would you rate your autobiography?
“I have to say the book is terrific.  We worked very hard to make it interesting, and never redundant or boring; to tell the truth -not only my personal truth, but the truth about tmy career, which is very difficult to do.  It has a lot of tips about how to make it in Communications:  how to succeed, how to break into television, how to become a writer.  But beyond that, it has a lot of practical advice about what to do when you’re a young professional woman with small children; how to do everything, and do it well.  It has practical help about dealing with age for a woman, which is very hard; what to do to keep the marriage alive after many years.  In short, it has a lot of how-to factual advice, which I think not only applies to professional women, but to whoever has to struggle to make her dreams a reality.

What do you say to those who call you egocentric?
“That they wouldn’t use that word if I were a man.  They would use adjectives like ‘ambicious,’ ‘aggressive,’ ‘persistent’.”

Which part of the book was most difficult for you to write?
“Ironically, the part that wasn’t published.  After two whole years of compiling material we realized that we had written two books in one.  We had gone 400 pages over, with all the gossip about the celebrities I had interviewed throughout my career.  Then, and even though we left a lot of it in, we decided to leave the rest for a second book.  This part was hard, because I know that people love to read about celebrities.  It was also very difficult choosing what to leave in without offending anyone, because I didn’t say anything about anybody that I wouldn’t like to have said about my children or about me.  I don’t think it’s necessary, and it’s certainly not what my career has been about all these years.”

What was the biggest secret you revealed?
“Out of all the things that I said that people didn’t know, the fact that Marc and I were married to other people when we fell in love for the first time.”

What plans do you have after the book?
“One of my professional goals is to create a media company with an editorial department, and have several magazines in addition to Cristina la Revista.  I would like to write several books, and also help other writers to mold their dreams on the written page. I would like for our company to become the link between Hollywood and Hispanic writers.  I would also like to produce young people on radio and television.

What do you think about un-authorized biographies?
“That they’re fun but mostly false, and a great waste of time.”

If "|My life as a Blonde" made it to Hollywood, what do you think it would be? A movie, a television series, or a comedy?
“Probably a little bit of everything, just like my life.  My life is a three-ring circus, and there’s something for everybody.  We’ve even been approached to do a comedy with my life stories.”

Whom do you want to star in it?
“Anybody who is a good actress, who has a highly developed sense of humor, and, above all, who has a highly developed rear-end like mine.”

Do you think people will change their opinion of you after reading your autobiography?
“I think they will definitely be surprised, because those who only see me on television only see one aspect of me, which many times sounds like an admonishing school marm. Now they’re going to know I have many more facets as a human being.  I can only hope that they will like those new facets.”

After reviewing your entire life in this autobiography, what do you think is the most positive thing you have achieved?
“So many times I have said to myself: ‘So much struggle...and for what?’ But after finishing the book I realized that the results have been largely positive, that it was all worth it, that the headaches and the hurts were worth it.  And I’m not just talking about success and fame and wealth.  By that I mean everything that I have been able to learn by doing a television program like "The Cristina Show", which, if people think I’ve shattered a lot of taboos, they don’t realize how many more personal taboos I’ve shattered myself.  They can’t possibly imagine how this show have helped me become a better mother, a better woman, a better wife...I feel as if God put the show in my path, not only so that people can learn, but so that I can grow in my own evolution as a human being.”

To whom did you dedicate this book?
“To Gloria and Emilio Estefan, Celia Cruz, and the former Editor-in-Chief of Cosmopolitan Magazine and my mentor, Mrs. Helen Gurley Brown.  They were the people who taught me how to deal with the madness of success and fame.  But above all, I dedicated my book to Marcos Avila, my husband, who is, has been, and always will be, my companion in all my life adventures.

Will we see the happiest moments of your life reflected in this book?
“Yes.  I have had many happy moments in my personal and professional life.  The days that each of my children was born are forever branded in my mind. To have dared pursue with passion the one true love of my life and marry him, even though he is eleven years my junior.  The day I spoke before the United Nations and everyone applauded me.  And the most incredible day to date: When I celebrated my 50th birthday surrounded by all my friends and family. For the first time in my life, I felt like an adult woman who had earned the right to have opinions, not as a professional, but as a female in the world.