<![CDATA[Gawker: defamer, memoirs]]> http://tags.gawker.com/assets/base/img/thumbs140x140/gawker.com.png <![CDATA[Gawker: defamer, memoirs]]> http://gawker.com/tag/defamer/memoirs http://gawker.com/tag/defamer/memoirs <![CDATA[Any Old Wacko Now Eligible For $2 Million Book Deal]]> The publishing industry is led by experienced professionals with deep knowledge of literary appeal. So if they say Kathy Griffin deserves a $2 million book deal, who are you, the public, to argue?

Today Condoleezza Rice signed a three-book deal worth $2.5 million. Okay, maybe a bit more than you want to hear from Condi, but she was Secretary of State and all that, and presumably saw George Bush drunk and naked dozens of times, so she could conceivably sell a few books.

Earlier this month, Diane Keaton got a book deal reported to be worth more than $2 million. Does she have that many fans, really? I don't know, I doubt it, but maybe, who knows? She was in some good movies!

But this?

The comedian Kathy Griffin is writing a memoir, and according to three sources with knowledge of the deal, her literary agent at Endeavor, former Dutton editor-in-chief Trena Keating, sold it at auction last week to an editor at Random House's Ballantine imprint for more than $2 million.

Unless this is titled "Knocking the Dicks Out of My Mouth: 100 Celebrities I Have Slept With Who Would Do Anything For That Fact to Remain Secret," by Kathy Griffin, we fear that the book industry may be losing its grip on reality. [NYO]

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<![CDATA[Do We Really Need Another Celebrity Memoir?]]> It's been announced that Kelly Osbourne is going to write a memoir. Not just any memoir, but an inspirational autobiography, which "will draw upon her own extraordinary experiences to help other young women as they negotiate the minefield that is growing up." Oh, so it's part life story, part self-help? Well, Kelly had better add some extra stuff into her book: She's only 23. A few months ago, it was reported that Miley Cyrus, fifteen, is writing a memoir. Writes the Guardian's Oliver Marre, "As autobiographers get younger (a trend you may have noticed), so the need to explain that their books are more than just straightforward memoirs becomes greater." Books are just another branch on the product tree, right next to fragrance and fashion line. But filling up chapters isn't as easy as filling perfume bottles. What about content?

Some celebrity-penned tomes seem like they might actually contain worthwhile information: Celebrity Detox by Rosie O'Donnell, for instance, or How I Play Golf by Tiger Woods. But what about Naomi Campbell's Naomi? Victoria Beckham's That Extra Half An Inch? Or Tori Spelling's unfortunately titled sTORI Telling?

Kelly Osbourne and Miley Cyrus have definitely had life experiences that are not "average," but is there enough to fill a book? And who will buy their stories? (And who will ghostwrite???)

While I don't have any celebrity autobiographies (well, someone did give me Raising Kanye, by Donda West), I asked around and Megan owns Gracie by George Burns. Megan and Jessica both own Me, by Katherine Hepburn. Jessica says: "Also I read Drew Barrymore's sex and drug addled teen memoir when I was at camp in 1995. It was totally passed around like contraband." Maria used to have Beauty Inside And Out, by Tyra. Margaret admits: "I own Having It All by Erika Kane. Note this is not a book about Susan Lucci, but a celebrity autobiography written by the fictional character she plays on All My Children. I don't want to discuss why I own this. The shame runs too deep." Fess up: Do you own (or have you read) celebrity memoirs?

Why Are So Many New Memoirs 'Inspirational'? [Guardian]

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<![CDATA[Barbara Walters' Memoir Packed With Tales Of Former 'Lovahs', Including 'The Blackest Man' She Ever Slept With]]> The ladies of The View had a lengthy meta-conversation all about the "very beautiful!" and "sexy!" photos of their own Barbara Walters in this month's Vanity Fair. And while they do point out the photo spread's accompanying excerpt from Walters' new memoir Auditions, and Babs does allude to tales of past "lovahs," she fails to mention (until Oprah makes her next week) just how tantalizing some of those pages are. As today's preview in the NY Daily News reveals, Walters was involved in a long-term affair with an African-American senator back in the swingin' 70s. And from the sound of it, the affair was far spicier than all those Adrian Lyne movies about adultery:

"When her lover...told the newswoman she was the oldest woman he had ever been with, she wanted to say - but never did - 'Oh yeah? Well you are the blackest man I have ever been with.'"
And the juice doesn't end there. More on Walters' fury over Star Jones' dieting claims and Rosie O'Donnell's Diana Ross complex after the jump.

While we await the sordid details surrounding the affair Walters is set to share with Oprah on Tuesday, we do finally hear Walters' real feelings regarding previous co-hosts Star Jones and Rosie O'Donnell. As the NYDN reports, Walters was particularly livid "when Jones refused to admit publicly that she had gastric bypass surgery to lose weight [and] her co-workers were forced to lie for her." And as for Rosie, it seems all that tension across the spotless flower-laden table shared by the ladies was just as real as we suspected. As Walters puts it, "The premise of The View is that of a team working together, but for Rosie it was more like Diana Ross and the Supremes, as little by little she took over." And after learning just how saucy Babs has been in the past, it's clear that there's only room for one diva at the table, even if Walters prefers her trademark white-blonde feathered bob to an enormous afro.

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