Librarian's Favorite Nonfiction Books of 2011-Darlene's Pick

My favorite book of the year is Everyone Loves You When You're Dead: Journeys into Fame and Madness by Neil Strauss.  Strauss is an author and music journalist that has written for Rolling Stone, New York Times, and Esquire. The book contains snippets of  228 celebrity interviews and is broken down into ten acts such as The Worst Interview Ever and Mean Guys with Long Hair. You realize what a strange thing fame is when Strauss interviews Led Zeppelin while their manager is breaking in Jimmy Page's new shoes by walking the hotel hallway for an hour before he wears them. Strauss also finds that Tom Cruise can get very intense when he punched a clock, maybe because the interview wasn't going the way he wanted. This book is not serious literature by an means but is a good piece of pop culture journalism and a sincere look at fame directly from the celebrities themselves.