On the 6th day of Perezmas, pop culture gave to us…
SIX salacious celeb memoirs!
There must have been something in the water this year, because celebs from all over the spectrum were ready to open up about how they got to where they are now, for better or worse.
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And honestly, all the shocking true stories and wild claims have had us turning page after page, book after book, all year long waiting to see what happens next!
So without further ado, enjoy our picks for the six most salacious celeb memoirs of the past year (below)! What a wild year to open up and tell all!
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Demi Moore
Demi Moore made major waves in the second half of the year when publishing house HarperCollins released her memoir, Inside Out, on September 24. While most celebrity memoirs go halfway there in telling the “real” story, the former GI Jane star didn’t hold back at all.
Moore first opened up about an unimaginably rough childhood spent in a dysfunctional family, and then revealed more about her tough life as a teenager, suffering through terribly dangerous situations under the sole guardianship of her mother, who was a bipolar addict. It’s too much to take at times, but it’s also real — and vulnerable.
As expected, Moore also wrote extensively about her longtime relationship with Ashton Kutcher, revealing accusations of cheating, coerced threesomes, and major alcohol problems that all combined to draw quite a dark cloud over what had previously been seen as a long-standing, successful relationship. Kutcher and his current partner, Mila Kunis, were able to withstand the memoir’s fallout, but it’s a testament to Demi’s sense of truth and raw, brutal honesty that her dark, authentic memoir was received in such a public way.
Jonathan Van Ness
Queer Eye star Jonathan Van Ness‘s memoir, Over the Top: A Raw Journey to Self-Love, became a New York Times bestseller in October of this year, several weeks after it was first released. It rose to the top for good reason, because the revelations he made within those pages — and the honesty and authenticity with which the fashionable TV icon told his story — was truly something to behold.
In the memoir and along it with accompanying interviews, Van Ness revealed he is HIV positive, opened up about his addiction past, and revealed himself to be a survivor of sexual abuse. The writing went deeper than that, though, telling stories of Van Ness’ first few difficult years working at a salon in Los Angeles for long hours and no pay, before ultimately realizing he wasn’t cut out for that life and quitting, only to have to start over from the bottom once again in New York City.
He also beautifully wrote of the challenges of being accepted (or, not accepted) as a gay young man growing up in small town America — a topic that has been explored many times, to be sure, but with which JVN right down to the bone. His writing about how he initially dealt with his HIV diagnosis was particularly poignant, as well. To see him reconcile all that with his success on Queer Eye definitively makes his memoir one of the best — and one of the most interesting — of the entire year.
Lamar Odom
Drug addiction nearly killed former NBA star Lamar Odom after his playing career ended — and this year proved to be the right time for him to talk about it, revealing more about his private life in his memoir Darkness to Light. The former Los Angeles Lakers star did a media blitz for his memoir back in May of this year, dropping shocking stories about the life he used to live — both in the NBA, and in some of the darkest corners when drug addiction hit him the hardest.
All along the way, ex-wife Khloé Kardashian was surprisingly supportive of Odom telling his story — because, after all, she’s arguably one of the ones who suffered the most as her marriage to the former pro athlete collapsed due to his constant cheating and horrible drug habit. Still, it couldn’t have been easy for her to hear about how the basketball star claims to have slept with more than 2,000 women, and it definitely wasn’t ideal that he outed Khloé for beating the s**t out of a stripper at an El Lay hotel! Er… oops?
Now, Lam-Lam’s comeback is one of the feel-good stories of the year, and even the title of his memoir suggests life has clearly gotten better for him through recovery and rehab. Today, he’s got a new love in his life, and the likable former hoops icon appears ready to repair his relationship with the KarJenner fam, as well.
Here’s to new beginnings and fresh starts!
Olivia Newton-John
Olivia Newton-John surprised the world in March when she released her memoir, Don’t Stop Believin’.
And as she put it in a press interview with THR at the time, the former Grease star is well-known to be “a very public person living a very private life,” so it was quite noteworthy to see her open up so much in her first-ever tell-all autobiography! Ever the classy, professional performer, Newton-John toes the line between giving it all away, and getting TOO salacious with her stories — like when she opens up about whether she ever dated famed co-star John Travolta!
The Xanadu icon chronicles a lot of what you’d expect in the autobiographical work, opening up about her early years, telling never-before-heard stories about her rise to fame, and giving remarkable insight into who she is behind the scenes. But she also goes there, too; her criticism of Universal Music Group over her contentious lawsuit against them for Grease royalties is a particularly biting look into the saga of working in the music industry.
She also has readers on the edge of their seats as she tries to make sense of the mysterious 2005 fake death and apparent re-emergence of her on-again, off-again boyfriend, Patrick McDermott. (BTW, that’s a wild story, and it alone may be worth the price of admission…)
Regardless, from trying to beat cancer to looking back at her iconic career, Newton-John opens up about it all, in her own sweet, classy way. It’s everything amazing we’ve come to expect from Sandra Dee — with a little controversy thrown in for good measure!
Robyn Crawford
Robyn Crawford’s tell-all, A Song For You: My Life With Whitney Houston, revealed endless heartbreaking details about the iconic singer, her incredible and sometimes tumultuous life, and her untimely, tragic death. At the core of the book is Crawford’s deep dive into her special friendship — and, for a time, their romantic and sexual relationship — with the superstar singer. Along with it, Crawford explores Bobby Brown’s significant (and mostly negative) impact on Whitney Houston’s life, as well as the events leading up to the singer’s death, which happened after the author had taken a step back from being as involved with Whitney and her entourage.
Crawford did quite a few media appearances to promote the memoir the it was released, but none hit quite like her time on Red Table Talk with host Jada Pinkett Smith. The openly gay woman revealed a great deal more about her long-standing love for Whitney, and how their relationship flourished for a time. She also opened up about how Whit reacted to stardom, and where her life turned after the bright lights of fame started to hit.
The author is an open book (pun intended) throughout the work, revealing new details and terrible stories about drug use, domestic violence, and more. Without question, Crawford’s impactful memoir here is one of the most salacious — and most well-written — memoirs of the year.
Elton John
With as long as he’s been in show business, it’s hard to believe Elton John hadn’t written a memoir before now — but here he is, with Me out in 2019, and oh boy, did it ever deliver! The Guardian called it “a landmark in the memoir genre,” while Daily Mail went so far as to crown it “the rock memoir of the decade,” and the reason behind both heaps of praise is simple: it’s really, really, really f**king good! And juicy, too!
Not only does Elton open up about his career, Princess Diana, and all the things you know him for if you saw Rocketman, he also shares some juicy new tidbits! In 1972, while traveling on a private plane during a US tour, his middle-aged mother made him watch Deep Throat (yes, THAT movie) because “everyone’s talking about it, aren’t they?” Once they got, um, a few scenes deep into the movie, his mother had a very different reaction: “Oh God, what’s happening now? Oh! I can’t look! How’s she doing that?” HA!!!
Elton also reveals in the book how he believes he didn’t get AIDS because he never liked sex that much (“I was an observer, a voyeur”), and had he been active instead of just watching others do it, he’d be dead right now. He recalls famous fights (Richard Gere and Sylvester Stallone nearly fought over Diana at a party), and famous duds (meeting Elvis Presley one year before The King’s death was a low point). He had a LOT of not-so-good things to say about Michael Jackson, while also revealing random facts (did you know Elton is Eminem‘s sobriety sponsor?). Crazy!
So there you go, Perezcious readers…
Another day of Perezmas, another memorable look back at the year that was in 2019!
And it’s maybe a little extra-special today considering these are now six good, page-turning, eye-popping books to read in 2020 if you haven’t cracked ’em open yet this year!
Anyways, what do U think about our choices for 2019’s most salacious celeb memoirs?? Would U have included any other works besides these?! Tell us! Sound off with all your opinions in the comments (below)!!!
[Image via FayesVision/Avalon/Instar/WENN]
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