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NASHVILLE, APRIL 8 -- A Louisiana woman claims in a book to be released next month that she had a 24-year affair with rock 'n' roll idol Elvis Presley that produced a daughter named Desiree.

Lucy de Barbin makes the claim in "Are You Lonesome Tonight?" which was coauthored by free-lance writer Dary Matera and is to be published by Villard Books.

David Bechwith, a spokesman for Presley's Graceland estate, said today that the claim was "ludicrous" and added: "Obviously, there's no basis in fact for any of it."

De Barbin claims she met Presley in 1953 before his climb to fame, when she was 16 and he was 18.

De Barbin, who was raised in Louisiana by French-born parents, claims she was forced into a family-arranged marriage at the age of 11 to a brutal man from Mississippi who was 30 years her senior. She says Presley's love gave her the courage to end that marriage.

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De Barbin, a mother of two when she met Presley, said her affair with Presley lasted 24 years and produced a daughter, Desiree, who is now 28.

She said they would meet secretly in parks and in hotel rooms across the country.

De Barbin said Presley asked her repeatedly to marry him, but she refused. She said she was making the story public now at Desiree's insistence.

Presley's marriage to Priscilla Presley produced one child, Lisa Marie.

Presley died in 1977 from heart failure, possibly brought on by overuse of drugs

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