Entertainment Memoir

"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.

The Police have sold more than 50 million albums, made Rolling Stone's Greatest Artists of All Time list, and finished a triumphant world reunion tour in 2008. Now British journalist Chris Campion draws on extensive research and new interviews to trace the inside saga of this iconic group, including the unorthodox business strategies employed by manager Miles Copeland that took them to the top and the intense rivalry that drove Sting, Andy Summers, and Stewart Copeland to split at the height of their success in the 1980s.

Born and raised on the streets of Southtown, two exits from the Mexico border, Sonny Sandoval was always going to go his own way. And as frontman of the platinum selling nu metal band P.O.D.—a group too Christian for the world and too secular for the church—he has broken every mold, defied every expectation, and reached into the hearts and minds of hundreds of thousands of people who wanted to belong to something but never felt like they fit in.

A consummate insider as the girlfriend of Lindsey Buckingham, Fleetwood Mac singer and guitarist, Carol Ann Harris leads fans into the very heart of the band's storms between 1976 and 1984. From interactions between the band and other stars - Mick Jagger, Eric Clapton, and Dennis Wilson - to the chaotic animosity between band members, this memoir combines the sensational account of some of the world's most famous musicians with a thrilling love story. The parties, fights, drug use, shenanigans, and sex lives of Fleetwood Mac are presented in intimate detail.

In 1992, the Screaming Trees were expected to become the next big band to come out of the Seattle music scene during the heyday of grunge. Except it never happened. It wasn't because the band didn't have great songs—indeed, the Trees were revered for their ability to write a great song that was both artistically original and commercially viable, which is no easy task. Other Seattle bands like Nirvana, Pearl Jam, and Soundgarden were fans of the Screaming Trees, playing shows with them and collaborating on albums, long before their own bands broke through into the mainstream.

Thelonious Monk is the critically acclaimed, gripping saga of an artist's struggle to "make it" without compromising his musical vision. It is a story that, like its subject, reflects the tidal ebbs and flows of American history in the 20th century. To his fans, he was the ultimate hipster; to his detractors, he was temperamental, eccentric, taciturn, or childlike. His angular melodies and dissonant harmonies shook the jazz world to its foundations, ushering in the birth of "bebop" and establishing Monk as one of America's greatest composers.

In the early 1970s, as our nation's youth railed against every conceivable societal norm, a funny-looking teenage Jew started turning up at open mike nights in various New York City comedy clubs. Surprisingly, he didn't suck. That funny-looking teenage Jew is now the even funnier-looking middle-aged comedian Gilbert Gottfried, who despite his transparent shortcomings has managed to carve out a hardly-respectable career - and a reputation for shock and awe unrivaled outside the Bush administration. With this scathingly funny book of rants and musings, Gottfried sullies an entirely new medium....

Once upon a time, if you wanted to know if a movie was worth seeing, you didn’t check out Rotten Tomatoes or IMDB. You asked whether Siskel & Ebert had given it “two thumbs up.” On a cold Saturday afternoon in 1975, two men (who had known each other for eight years before they’d ever...

After the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, the timing appeared perfect to bring Sesame Street to millions of children living in the former Soviet Union. With the Muppets envisioned as ideal ambassadors of Western values, no one anticipated just how challenging and dangerous this would prove to be. In Muppets in Moscow: The Unexpected Crazy True Story of Making Sesame Street in Russia, Natasha Lance Rogoff brings this gripping tale to life.

The smooth veneer of the duo's songs made Steely Dan popular and famous in the 1970s, but the polish glossed over the underlying layers of anger, disappointment, sleaze, and often downright weirdness lurking just beneath the surface. The elliptical lyrics—were—and continue to be-an endless source of fascination. What kind of person was capable of writing such songs? Donald Fagen has always kept his true self hidden behind walls of irony, confounding most journalistic enquiries. Nightfly cracks open the door to reveal the life behind the lyrics.

It's 1982 and the Ramones are in a gutter-bound spiral. Following a run of inconsistent albums and deep in the throes of internal tensions, the legendary quartet is about to crash and burn. Enter Richie Ramone. Then a 26-year-old from New Jersey named Richard Reinhardt, he's snapped up by the group to be their new drummer and instantly goes from the obscurity of the underground club scene to membership in the most famous punk-rock band of all time, revitalizing the pioneering outfit with his powerful, precise, and blindingly fast beats.

You’re falling through time so all I can do is fall with you. The numbness had set in long before I sat at your bedside. But even with senses impaired as the flight touches down at Belfast City I can somehow still feel the screeching of wheels on tarmac scorching something deep into me. So begins Gary Lightbody's phenomenal companion book to the latest, Snow Patrol’s number one album of the same name. While you don’t have to read it to understand the album, you may want to give the album a wee listen for some parts of the book to make sense.

Cured is not only the first insider account of the early days of the band, it is a revealing look at the artistic evolution of the enigmatic Robert Smith, the iconic lead singer, songwriter, and innovative guitarist at the heart of The Cure. A deeply rebellious, sensitive, tough, and often surprisingly "normal" young man, Smith was from the start destined for stardom, a fearless nonconformist and provocateur who soon found his own musical language through which to express his considerable and unique talent.

Renowned music historian Simon Morrison reveals the ballet as a crucible of art and politics, beginning with the disreputable inception of the theater in 1776 and proceeding through the era of imperial rule, the chaos of revolution, the oppressive Soviet years, and the recent $680 million renovation project. Drawing on exclusive archival research, Morrison creates a richly detailed tableau of the centuries-long war between world-class art and life-threatening politics that has defined this storied institution.

Actor David Suchet recalls his experience of playing Agatha Christie's world-famous detective, Hercule Poirot, for almost a quarter of a century. In the summer of 2013 David Suchet filmed his final scenes as Hercule Poirot. After 24 years in the role, he will have played the character in every story that Agatha Christie wrote about him (bar one, deemed unfilmable) and he will bid adieu to a role and a character that have changed his life.

Harry Freedman uncovers the spiritual traditions that lie behind Leonard Cohen's profound and unmistakable lyrics. The singer and poet Leonard Cohen was deeply learned in Judaism and Christianity, the spiritual traditions that underpinned his self-identity and the way he made sense of the world. In this book Harry Freedman, a leading author of cultural and religious history, explores the mystical and spiritual sources Cohen drew upon, discusses their original context and the stories and ideas behind them.

Considered by many to be the world's greatest bounty hunter, Duane "Dog" Chapman has become famous for capturing fugitives on Dog the Bounty Hunter, his number-one-rated show on A&E. But his job doesn't end when he cuffs his man - or woman. Having personally struggled against abuse, addiction, and a life of crime, Dog knows a thing or two about the path that these fugitives cuffed in the back of his car are on.

In this book, Corey Taylor undertakes something never before attempted in the history of rock superstardom: he takes you with him as he journeys undercover through various ghostbusting groups who do their best to gather information and evidence about the existence of spirits. Taylor also gives you a behind-the-scenes tour of his crazy life and the many beyond-the-grave events he's encountered. (You'll be shocked how often Slipknot has been invaded by the supernatural).

A searing confessional infused with the darkest humor, Permanent Midnight chronicles the opiated abyss of a Hollywood screenwriter and his formidable climb into sobriety. Made into a major motion picture starring Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson, Permanent Midnight is revered by critics and an ever-growing cult of devoted fans as one of the most compelling contemporary memoirs.

Limited Edition of One is unlike any other music book you will ever have hear. Part the long-awaited memoir of Steven Wilson, whose celebrated band Porcupine Tree began as teenage fiction before unintentionally evolving into a reality that encompassed Grammy-nominated records and sold-out shows around the world, before he set out for an even more successful solo career.