Bookshelf: Celebrity memoirs loomed large in 2023

Looking back over the year in publishing, one thing that stands out is the number of high-profile celebrity memoirs that came out in 2023. That’s not necessarily good news for professional authors â€" especially debut authors â€" because when publishers pay big bucks for books ghostwritten for actors and singers, there is less money to go around for publishing lesser-known authors. But fans of celebrity gossip and behind-the-scenes peeks at the lives of the rich and famous had a banner year packed with books by some of the biggest names in entertainment and pop culture.

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These days, Prince Harry and his wife Meghan’s celeb cred is a little tarnished, following reports that donations have significantly declined for their foundation and their highly touted deals with Netflix and Spotify have fizzled. But this time last year, they were all the buzz in the walkup to the release of Harry’s highly anticipated memoir “Spare” (Random House, $38), which published in early January.

Among the 416-page tell-all’s revelations are details about Harry’s military service, in which he killed 25 members of the Taliban; his recreational drug use, his tense relationship with brother William, and his discovery that Queen Elizabeth died via the BBC. Audiobook readers delighted in having the Duke of Sussex himself read the text.

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In the spring came country rocker Lucinda Williams’ memoir “Don’t Tell Anybody the Secrets I Told You” (Crown, 28.99). The singer-songwriter with a whiskey-soaked voice chronicles her difficulty breaking into the business because she was too country for rock and too rock for country; the band members, producers and directors she kicked to the curb in her effort to maintain control of her career and image; and her relationships with a string of bad boyfriends who inspired great songs. It ends well, though, with her happy marriage to her producer, manager and co-songwriter Tom Overby. Williams also reads the audio version.

Actor Elliot Page of “Juno” and “The Umbrella Academy” fame details with great candor his experiences first coming out as gay and then transitioning gender while maintaining a career in the Hollywood spotlight in “Pageboy: A Requiem” (Flatiron Books, $18.99 paperback), which published in June. The book also explores the current backlash against trans and LGBTQ rights by political conservatives from his unique perspective as a trans man.

Credit: Tiny Reparations Books

Credit: Tiny Reparations Books

Reggie Watts is a unique talent who has combined comedy, music and beatboxing to delightful effect on stage, in Netflix specials, on the TV show “Comedy Bang! Bang!” and as the in-house bandleader for “The Late Late Show with Jim Corden.” In his fall memoir “Great Falls, MT” (Tiny Reparations Books, $29), he revisits his youth as a biracial boy born in Germany to an American father and French mother who uproot him from his multi-language-speaking, European existence to small-town Montana. Subtitled “Fast Times, Post-Punk Weirdoes and a Tale of Coming Home Again,” it’s a sweet ode to his adopted hometown and a celebration of finding your tribe no matter where you are.

On the heels of Watts’ memoir was the highly anticipated tell-all from Britney Spears, “The Woman in Me” (Gallery Books, $32.99). Ever since the pop singer was released from her conservatorship in late 2021, fans have been clamoring for her side of the story, and they finally got it. Among the revelations: she felt like a “child-robot” forced to work out, wear her hair long and take certain medications; she was often body-shamed by her father; she began drinking alcohol with her mother in eighth grade; and she had an abortion after getting impregnated by Justin Timberlake. Actress Michelle Williams reads the audiobook.

And closing out the year is the one and only Barbra Streisand, whose expansive autobiography, “My Name is Barbra” (Viking, $47), weighs in at a whopping 992 pages. Beginning with her deprived childhood and spanning a lifetime of musical and cinematic accomplishments, the book leaves no stone unturned and no name undropped as it explores her determination to not alter her nose, the ups and downs of her many romantic relationships, and her battles to control the course of her career and image, which, come to think of it, could be the overall theme for all six of these memoirs. Naturally, Babs voices the audiobook.

Suzanne Van Atten is a book critic for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. She can be reached at suzanne.vanatten@ajc.com.