That was quick! Yup, the lazy days of summer has begun and with it comes the task of choosing books that will get you through lots of hot days by the pool and at the lake. I’ve already planned a weekend trip to the legendary family-owned bookstore the Strand. If I am lucky I might even bump into Nancy who runs the store with her dad Fred. I haven’t seen Nancy since our kids attended nursery school together.
I put my summer reading list together weeks ago . It’s an eclectic list ranging from Chick Lit to memoirs, poetry books to a few DIY-ers – learning how to Code and even one on how to build a doghouse .
In just a few days the family and I will head to Pennsylvania to officially start our summer vacation. I’ve made the necessary stops at the library to pick up the kids’ books for their required summer reading, With reading materials put on reserve for pickup our evenings for reading are squared away and will be filled with adventures, laughs and visits to far off lands thanks in part to our books.
One title I am looking forward to curling up with is the Melissa Rivers bestselling memoir, ‘The Book of Joan.’
I’ve had this book a few weeks now but have held off reading saving it for my summer reading. Having only skimmed over the first chapter I am besides myself to just dig in and read it all in one non-stop go.
After meeting and and hearing Melissa speak about her mom at a luncheon during her NYC press tour I grew to like her even more than before. I was even lucky enough to have my copy of her memoir personally signed by her. So this book is a define keepsake.
Since its release, the book has been climbing the bestseller charts and is currently sitting on the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times’ and USA Todays’ Bestsellers books lists.
A quick sneak peek in Chapter One already has me in stitches. I can already tell this is going to be lots of laughs-out-loud. I am literally rolling on the floor as Melissa retells events from her life with her mum. Joan truly shines through each pages and at every mention .
I am pleased that Melissa was able to take readers into the world she shared with her mother, giving readers a first class, front row seats into their wacky, funny and loving family life. I can’t wait to read even more.
When Melissa arrived at the MOMS event held at Juniper Bar in Midtown Manhattan, I half expected to see Joan following directly behind her.Smiling, she greeted everyone with a wide smile and an excited “Hello everybody.” Dressed in a fun floral swing dress to the knees and copper pumps she quickly took her seat next to hosts Denise Albert and Melissa Musen Gerstein the co-creators of The MOMS . The trio chatted about everything Joan and family life.
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I left the event feeling that Melissa Rivers is funny as hell. It was clearly visible how alike in personalities she and mom Joan really are.
Writing the book gave me permission to laugh.-—Melissa Rivers
Melissa looked happy and everyone present noticed it. It was good to see that 8 months after her mother’s passing the single mom was looking healthy and happy.
“I don’t come from a family where you sit in a puddle and fall apart,” Rivers said off the bat in dealing with the loss of her mum, Joan’s death in 2014 she says plainly, ” You get up and you go forward.”
Readers will come away knowing how kind my mother was and how real she was.” – Melissa Rivers
Melissa Rivers poses with The MOMS, CrownHeightsMom and other mom bloggers at Juniper Bar in NYC
After Joan was buried Melissa jumped head first into writing her memoir. Thanks to her editor whom she she recalled meeting the day of the funeral when, as Melissa tells the story “this lady walked up to me extended her condolences and proceeded to kindly place a business card into my hands.” The rest is history – the result a well written and oh so funny memoir that will make Joan proud.
This book gives you a moment to laugh.”–Melissa Rivers
Writing the book say Melissa brought comfort as well as a flurry of emotions– joy and tears. “I sat for a few hours every day and a couple of times every week with my writing partner and I remembered funny stories and it allowed me to laugh. It gave me permission where nobody can judge me. It’s a funny book.Writing the book gave me permission to laugh. Melissa adds that these feelings and memories spawned a bigger mission for her—preserving her mother’s legacy.
On June 8 the GRAMMY Museum debuted its latest exhibit, Joan Rivers: Can We Talk? to commemorate the comedian’s life . Joan won a posthumous Grammy in February for Best Spoken Word for her Diary of a Mad Diva. The current Grammy exhibit showcases various stage costumes worn by Joan during her career. It also features family photos, her Hollywood Walk of Fame Star award, her hardcover book collection- including several of her New York Times bestsellers, the 1984 Harvard Hasty Pudding Woman of the Year Award, her 1990 Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Talk/Service Show Host and one of her Louis Vuitton travel trunks. The exhibit runs through September 20th.
Going it alone without both parents, Melissa says she misses them (her dad passed away when she was almost 18) but, she has kept going for her only child, Cooper 14. “Having kids changes the dynamics of how you get through grief” says Melissa . “You get up and you move forward,” she says, adding, “That is how we have lived our whole live. There are days that are angry days, some that are painful days and that’s fine. ” Adds the proud mom, “My son needs to see that there is light at the end of every tunnel. Yes, there are days that are horrible and it sucks, but we are going through it. The example has to be that life continues and it does. That is what your parents would want you to show your children.”
“There was such a realness to our relationship [ it ] that everyone could see a little bit of themselves.”-Melissa Rivers on the relationship she shared with mum Joan.
On working with her mum for so long. Melissa says, ” In creating a career with my mom, it was hard and it was difficult and it was frustrating. It was coming to peace and terms with a lot of certain things and understanding that there are preconceived notions,” she notes, adding,” For me it was having to work harder than everybody else to prove that I am my own person.”
Coming from a showbiz family she says of going into the biz.”If you are going where your parents went and your parents were successful, you are going to have to work harder. You might get the interview but you are not going to get the job because of it.” If you get the job everybody will say you only got it because of your parents, so you have to work ten times harder just to be considered to be as good as everybody else and you know that and it doesn’t make it fair and it doesn’t make it less frustrating.
“We never let her drive! The worst words to hear at home from my mom was, ‘Melissa get in the car!'”-Melissa Rivers on mom Joan’s driving.
Melissa admits that growing up as the daughter of Joan Rivers wasn’t easy. “I wrestled control over certain things by the time I was 17.” In facts she says, “We never let her drive! The worst words to hear at home from my mom was, ‘Melissa get in the car'”. Other things say Melissa included Joan hiding money around the house. ” She was also not good with her Blackberry and she could not deal with the iPhone, at all,”adds Melissa.
Writing the book made it ok to laugh and ok to say we are all a little crazy.”—Melissa Rivers
Melissa says she hopes that the take away from reading “The Book of Joan” will be that, “readers will come away knowing how kind my mother was and how real she was.” She adds that she hopes that it gives readers a moment to stop and laugh. ” About that special thing her and mom Joan shared she says, “What resonated with us is that people related to us. Everyone could see a little bit of themselves with us and admitted it was ok to laugh.My mother’s personality was so big and she was so well known and was such a character you are hearing about it in her voice but from my point of view, which is different from her point of view. ”
I want people to know that even though our lives were crazy we took moments to laugh.- Melissa Rivers
“One of the things that always resonated with my business partnership with my mother and our performing together and her being her and me being me is that people related to us because of the mother daughter relationship. There was such a realness to it that everyone could see a little bit of themselves. It made it ok to laugh and say ok, we are all a little crazy,” says the Fashion Police co-host.
If you would like your own copy of Melissa River’s memoir “The Book Of Joan” you can grab it at the Strand Bookstore in NYC or at their website here.
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