Biographies & Memoirs

Central to RuPaul’s success has been his chameleonic adaptability. From drag icon to powerhouse producer of one of the world’s largest television franchises, RuPaul’s ever-shifting nature has always been part of his brand as both supermodel and supermogul.

There is a voice of longing inside each woman. We strive so mightily to be good: good partners, daughters, mothers, employees, and friends. We hope all this striving will make us feel alive. Instead, it leaves us feeling weary, stuck, overwhelmed, and underwhelmed....

Oscar-nominated star Elliot Page captures the universal human experience of searching for ourselves and our place in this complicated world....

The woman behind the icon known as Elvira, Mistress of the Dark, the undisputed Queen of Halloween, reveals her full story, filled with intimate bombshells - and told by the bombshell herself....

A mother and son embark on the road trip of a lifetime in a charming, poignant essay about making memories, facing fears, and donning fried-egg costumes by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Less.

Angela Davis has been a political activist at the cutting edge of the Black Liberation, feminist, queer, and prison-abolitionist movements for more than 50 years....

Ma's unfiltered storytelling takes you on a journey spanning five generations, three centuries, and two continents, offering a comedic yet poignant exploration of family, resilience, and the pursuit of lost glory....

For nearly four decades, David Sedaris has faithfully kept a diary in which he records his thoughts and observations on the odd and funny events he witnesses....

Running with Scissors is the true story of a boy whose mother (a poet with delusions of being Anne Sexton) gave him away...

By the time Will Schwalbe was a junior at college, he had already met everyone he cared to know: the theater people, writers, visual artists and comp lit majors, and various other quirky characters including the handful of students who shared his own major, Latin and Greek....

Award-winning actor, creator of a myriad of memorable characters from Lady Whiteadder to Professor Sprout, Miriam Margolyes is a national treasure....

With raw and inspiring stories about learning how to handle the scary sh*t, XOXO, Cody is a bold and heartfelt reminder that sometimes laughing at yourself is the best medicine. Remember: It ain’t that deep, boo....

Chicago is a world-class city, but it is also a city in crisis. For four years, the person at the center of this storm was Lori Lightfoot.

Searing and extremely personal essays, shot through with the darkest elements America can manifest, while discovering light and humor in unexpected corners....

Twenty years after the success of her first memoir, the New York Times bestseller The Truth Is . . ., the Grammy and Oscar award-winning rocker and trailblazing LGBTQAI icon takes stock of the intervening years, recounting the euphoric triumphs and the life-altering tragedies of her life....

You may not know it, but you've met Augusten Burroughs. You've seen him on the street, in bars, on the subway, at restaurants...

The legendary frontman of Judas Priest, one of the most successful heavy metal bands of all time, celebrates five decades of heavy metal in this tell-all memoir....

The man behind the Real Housewives writes about his lifelong love affair with pop culture that brought him from the suburbs of St. Louis to his own television show....

When his mother, Barbara, turns seventy, Jedidiah Jenkins is reminded of a sobering truth: Our parents won’t live forever. For years, he and Barbara have talked about taking a trip together, just the two of them....

Figuring explores the complexities of love and the human search for truth and meaning through the interconnected lives of several historical figures across four centuries....

In this poignant and urgent love letter to his son, award-winning Broadway, TV, and film producer Richie Jackson reflects on his experiences as a gay man in America and the progress and setbacks of the LGBTQ community over the last 50 years....

In this inspiring and intimate self-portrait of the champion of equality that encompasses a brilliant tennis career, unwavering activism, and an ongoing commitment to fairness and social justice, Billie Jean King details her life's journey to find her true self....

Growing up on Long Island, lonely and quiet and queer, she was enchanted by Hollywood starlets like Kim Novak....

From the iconic musicians Tegan and Sara comes a memoir about high school, detailing their first loves and first songs in a compelling look back at their humble beginnings....

An inspirational and bold memoir from the most successful woman ever to compete on Jeopardy!—and an exploration of what it means to ask questions of the world and of yourself....

Through her own – often bloody-minded – determination and the medical skill of others, April Ashley became the woman she had always believed herself to be. And for half a dozen decades she soared around, over and above momentous and turbulent times, difficult, and changing times when, finally, who you wanted to be and who you could be became the cultural topic of the day. She overcame opprobrium and penury and became renowned and celebrated for one specific achievement: being April Ashley.

Upon moving to the Gulf States – where penalties for queer acts include deportation, imprisonment, torture and death – Gaar Adams wants to understand why LGBTQ+ migrants might choose to live amid such peril. From the UAE to Bahrain and Oman to Saudi Arabia – a region where four out of five residents are noncitizens – he begins riskily gathering interviews outside the tightly controlled state media, leading with what he thinks is a simple question:

Rebel Rising follows Rebel Wilson's incredible journey of "making it," constantly questioning "Am I good enough?", "Will I ever find love?" and "Will I ever change and become healthy?" Rebel writes for the first time about her most personal and important moments in her life—from fertility issues, weight gain and loss, sexuality, overcoming shyness, rejections and, well...okay there's at least one story thrown in about Brad Pitt! It's all here. This memoir shows us how to love ourselves, while making us laugh uncontrollably.

The Dead Don’t Need Reminding is a braided story of Julian Randall’s return from the cliff edge of a harrowing depression and his determination to retrace the hustle of a white-passing grandfather to the Mississippi town from which he was driven amid threats of tar and feather.

Ryousuke Nanasaki married his husband in 2016 in the first religiously recognized same-sex wedding in Japanese history. This collection of essays follows Ryousuke's search for love on the journey to his extraordinary marriage. From unrequited junior high crushes to awkward dating sites to finally finding a community, Ryousuke's heartfelt reflections on his coming-of-age as a young gay man in Hokkaido will touch listeners all over the world.

"Pride & Prejudice: Healing Division in the Modern Family" is a heartfelt exploration into the intricate balance between celebrating one's identity ("pride") and confronting ingrained biases ("prejudice"). Dr. Matt R. Salmon shares his experience growing up queer in a family and religion that condemned it. Drawing upon professional expertise and unique life experiences, this book offers a fresh perspective on the challenges and opportunities that arise in families with LGBTQ+ members.

In this pyrotechnic memoir-in-essays, Mak ranges widely over our landscape of paranoia, crisis, and frenetic, clickable consumption. He grants listeners an inside pass to the spaces where culture was made and unmade over the past decade, from the antiseptic glare of white-walled galleries to the darkest corners of Berlin techno clubs. As the gay son of an evangelical minister, Mak fled to those spaces, hoping to join a global, influential elite. But when calamity struck, it forced Mak to confront the costs of mistaking status for belonging.

Weaving together memoir and cutting-edge science, Mothership is not just a queer coming-of-age story. It's a deeply researched account of how coral reefs and a psychedelic tea called ayahuasca helped Greg heal from complex PTSD—a disorder of trust, which makes the very act of bonding with someone else panic-inducing. From the tide pools in Florida where he grew up, to Indonesia's Raja Ampat archipelago and the Amazon rainforest, this is his search for wholeness when talk therapy and pharmaceuticals did little to help.

In her memoir, Dr Phelps candidly explores her struggles and achievements, in medicine, media and politics – from her advocacy around Medevac and COVID-19 management, to the fallout of her public ‘outing’ in the Australian media and her inspirational role in the Teal movement of the 2022 elections. She also reflects on the ideas and passions that have motivated and sustained her during these times, including her philosophies of leadership and equality, and her love of nature.

No one will ever silence my creative voice again, even if there's no end of people who would gladly celebrate my death, just because I let my purple bird fly. Without shining my reason upon this bleak wasteland, I'd have no book to share, and our hateful world would have successfully murdered me. So I'll live joyously even if that means my death, but I'll never die before my soul strikes back.

Portia de Rossi and Ellen DeGeneres are two well-known people whose lives, love story, and lasting influence are thoroughly examined in this book. It covers each of their separate trajectories in the entertainment business while highlighting key turning points. It also goes into detail about how their incredible love story defied expectations and turned into a sign of acceptance and hope for the LGBTQ+ community. Beyond their private lives, the book highlights their charity and advocacy efforts, highlighting their dedication to bringing about constructive change. Additionally, it humanizes ...

Andrew Sean Greer can’t wait to get home to San Francisco after a writer’s residency in Kansas. But when his mother, Sandra, decides to come along for the ride, he has a new goal: get her to crack a smile at every stop, whether breathtaking or breathtakingly kitschy. He’s always known his mother to be as efficient and serious as a chemist (which she happens to be), always in gray, eyebrow cocked, and handling challenges with grace. To mix things up, Andrew develops an elaborate itinerary of planned chaos.

In his debut memoir, Won’t Be Silent, Abe Gurko invites you to join him in celebrating a life that he calls “finally worth living.” It’s an honest, rollicking ride filled with joyous and life-affirming as well as challenging, daunting, and heartbreaking situations that he navigates with aplomb, though not always.

In the turbulent voyage of life, where traumas weigh like anchors and relationships often drift, Remember Who the F*ck You Are raises a clarion call: Keep Going. The message? Amidst life’s tempests, resilience is your compass, and tenacity, your sail. Expect a profound mix of raw vulnerability, tales that might sting with their familiarity, emotional peaks and valleys, and a sprinkle of humor to lighten the darkest corners.

In a heartbreaking yet hopeful collection of personal essays and prose poems, blending the confessional, political, and literary, Kai Cheng Thom dives deep into the questions that haunt social movements today. With the author's characteristic eloquence and honesty, I Hope We Choose Love proposes heartfelt solutions on the topics of violence, complicity, family, vengeance, and forgiveness.