Memoirs Biographys Celebrity

Ian Karmel has weighed eight pounds and he has weighed 420 pounds and right now he’s almost exactly in between the two, but this book is not a weight-loss book. It’s about being a fat person in a skinny world. It’s about gym class and football practice, about chicken wings and juice cleanses, about airplane seats and roller coasters, about fat jokes and Jabba the Hutt, about crying in the Big and Tall section and the joys of being a sneakerhead, about prediabetes and gout, and about realizing that you actually don’t want to eat yourself to death and hoping it’s not too late.

Wherever Chelsea Handler travels, one thing is certain: she always ends up in the land of the ridiculous. Now, in this uproarious collection, she sneaks her sharp wit through airport security and delivers her most absurd and hilarious stories ever.

Kenan Thompson is Saturday Night Live’s longest-ever-serving cast member and a star of such pioneering sketches as “Black Jeopardy” and is hugely beloved thanks to a tidal wave of nostalgic fans who grew up on early 2000s classics All That, Good Burger, and Kenan & Kel on Nickelodeon. He’s also a dad (to two girls) in his mid-40s living in suburbia, and whose universal, relatable, family-friendly humor has created unbelievable appeal and engagement from fans from middle America to coastal elites. Becoming a dad sucked the cool right out of him—and he's OK with that!

Longtime Jeopardy! host and television icon Alex Trebek reflects on his life and career. The book combines illuminating personal anecdotes with Trebek’s thoughts on a range of topics, including marriage, parenthood, education, success, spirituality, and philanthropy. Trebek also addresses the questions he gets asked most often by Jeopardy! fans, such as what prompted him to shave his signature mustache, his insights on legendary players like Ken Jennings and James Holzhauer, and his opinion of Will Ferrell’s Saturday Night Live impersonation.

From New York Times best-selling author Kathy Griffin, an A-Z compendium of the celebrities she's met over the years and the jaw-dropping, charming, and sometimes bizarre anecdotes only she can tell about them. Starting with Woody Allen and making pit stops with Demi Lovato, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Donald Trump, Kathy Griffin finally lifts the veil on her never-before-told run-ins with the famous and the infamous.

Get a completely new look at guitar legend Eddie Van Halen with this groundbreaking oral history, composed of more than 50 hours of interviews with Eddie himself as well as his family, friends, and colleagues.

Joel Miller is an ex-roadie for Guns N’ Roses, Poison, Stone Temple Pilots, and the Cranberries. The book is an often-hilarious personal account of a young man in his early 20s trying to be a “good” roadie while also trying to understand life’s big picture. Through the advice of rock stars and career roadies Joel tries to find the pathway to roadie righteousness.

"Salut, je m'appelle Matthew, mais vous me connaissez peut-être sous un autre nom. Mes amis m'appellent Matty. Et je devrais être mort." Ainsi commence le captivant récit du célèbre Matthew Perry, acteur qui incarna le légendaire Chandler de Friends. Au fil de ses souvenirs, il évoque ses ambitions de jeunesse et son rapport à la célébrité, ses addictions et sa guérison après un grave problème de santé qui lui fit frôler la mort.

Believe it or not, America's fascination with celebrity culture was thriving well before the days of TMZ, Perez Hilton, Charlie Sheen's breakdown, and allegations against Woody Allen. And the stars of yesteryear? They weren't always the saints that we make them out to be. Part biography, part cultural history, the stories contained in this book cover the stuff that films are made of: love, sex, drugs, illegitimate children, illicit affairs, and botched cover-ups.

With the Beatles, John Lennon surpasses his youthful dreams, achieving a level of superstardom that defies classification. “We were the best bloody band there was,” he says. “There was nobody to touch us.” Nobody except the original nowhere man, Mark David Chapman. Chapman once worshipped his idols from afar - but now harbors grudges against those, like Lennon, whom he feels betrayed him. He’s convinced Lennon has misled fans with his message of hope and peace. And Chapman’s not staying away any longer.

Through such hits as "The Sound of Silence", "Bridge Over Troubled Water", "Still Crazy After All These Years", and "Graceland", Paul Simon has spoken to us in songs for a half-century about alienation, doubt, resilience, and empathy in ways that have established him as one of the most honored and beloved songwriters in American pop music history. His music has gone beyond the sales charts into our cultural consciousness. He was the first songwriter awarded the Gershwin Prize by the Library of Congress and is a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame.

When Jeremy Camp lost his beloved wife Melissa just three months after their wedding, the last thing he wanted to do was sing praise to God. But even as he struggled through unimaginable grief and fought to hold on to his faith, God had other plans: Pick up your guitar. I have something for you to write.

In her current reign at Power 105.1 and for nearly two decades at New York's Hot 97, Angie Martinez has had one of the highest rated radio shows in the country. After working her way up as an intern, she burst on the scene as a young female jock whose on-air "Battle of the Beats" segment broke records and became a platform for emerging artists like a young Jay Z. Angie quickly became known for intimate, high-profile interviews, mediating feuds between artists, and taking on the most controversial issues in hip-hop.

Judas Priest formed in the industrial city of Birmingham, England, in 1969. With its distinctive twin-guitar sound, studs-and-leather image, and international sales of over 50 million records, Judas Priest became the archetypal heavy metal band in the 1980s. Iconic tracks like "Breaking the Law", "Living After Midnight", and "You've Got Another Thing Coming" helped the band achieve extraordinary success, but no one from the band has stepped out to tell their or the band's story until now.

Born Erik Weisz in Budapest in 1874, Houdini grew up an impoverished Jewish immigrant in the Midwest and became world-famous thanks to talent, industry, and ferocious determination. Nobody knows how Houdini performed some of his dazzling, death-defying tricks, and nobody knows, finally, why he felt compelled to punish and imprison himself over and over again. Tracking the restless Houdini's wide-ranging exploits, acclaimed biographer Adam Begley tells the story of a mystifying man's astonishing career.

Following a run of New Year's concerts at San Francisco's legendary Fillmore, Patti Smith finds herself tramping the coast of Santa Cruz, about to embark on a year of solitary wandering. Unfettered by logic or time, she draws us into her private wonderland with no design, yet heeding signs - including a talking sign that looms above her, prodding and sparring like the Cheshire Cat. In February, a surreal lunar year begins, bringing with it unexpected turns, mischief, and inescapable sorrow. In a stranger's words, "Anything is possible: after all, it's the Year of the Monkey."

If you can count on one thing from "Madea" Mabel Simmons, star of Diary of a Mad Black Woman and Madea's Family Reunion, it's that she's got something to say. She's the beloved, hilarious, sharp-witted, pistol-packing grandmother who's watching out and speaking her mind. Now Madea is telling her own story, dishing her memoirs and hard-won, hilarious wisdom in her own inimitable voice (with a little help from her friend Tyler Perry).

Maitland Ward got her start in acting as a teenager when she was cast in The Bold and the Beautiful, but it wasn’t until she joined the later seasons of the sitcom Boy Meets World that she got her first taste of fame. As the loveable co-ed Rachel McGuire, Ward soon found herself being typecast as the good girl next door and was repeatedly denied darker, more intriguing roles. So she made a career change—one that required her to turn away from the Disney universe—and eventually established herself as one of the most-respected actresses in the porn industry today.

Dave Van Ronk was one of the founding figures of the 1960s folk revival, but he was far more than that. A pioneer of modern acoustic blues, a fine songwriter and arranger, a powerful singer, and one of the most influential guitarists of the ’60s, he was also a marvelous storyteller, a peerless musical historian, and one of the most quotable figures on the Village scene. The Mayor of MacDougal Street is a firsthand account by a major player in the social and musical history of the ’50s and ’60s.

From being escorted off the Today programme (for saying what we were all thinking) to declaring her love to Vanessa Redgrave; from Tales of the Unexpected to Graham Norton's sofa, she is our most loved and most outspoken national treasure. Oh Miriam! takes you inside both her head and her heart. Buckle up for the most irrepressible, hilarious and moving listen of 2023.