Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #177880 in Books
• Published on: 2002-11-07
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Synopsis
In the eleven years since she burst onto the international music scene, Melissa Etheridge has released seven albums that have sold more than 25 million records worldwide, garnering not only public adoration for her uncompromising honesty but numerous critical awards, including two Grammys and the prestigious ASCAP Songwriter of the year award. Her personal journey has been captured over the years through her music, transforming her voice and musicianship into inspiring messages of love, consciousness, hope, longing, desire and pure passion. THE TRUTH IS...is an extremely rare, intimate, and highly charged autobiography - a bold and unflinching account of an extraordinary life, described as only Melissa can: from her Kansas roots through her early love of music to her brilliant rise to stardom in a male-dominated rock world. Melissa discusses the massive impact of her publicly coming out, a revelation that only increased her popularity, making her a highly visible spokesperson for the gay and lesbian community. THE TRUTH IS...shares Melissa Etheridge"s fascinating story - sometimes shocking, always inspiring - with unprecedented candour and insight.

Customer Reviews

brutally honest...brilliant!
Wow. I've just finished reading this book and it has left me in a kind of stupor. It may be one of the shorter biographies out there but the title says it all. What it is saying is `this is the truth, as I see it and saw it then, feel it now and felt it then.'

There are so many things about this book that I love firstly that it's so raw and pure that it has left me bewildered and yet full of emotion towards this woman who doesn't even know I exist. The tale is so simply told but it grabs you till you can almost feel what she feels...the pain, sorrow and happiness become yours.
There's quite a bit on where her music comes from. The real stories behind some of the lyrics that have become so famous, and you'll be amazed just how different they can be from general perception. One of my favourite is how she came to write `sleep', the presence of which had always seemed odd on her `Breakdown' album. The bittersweet origins have made this song a little more special to me as I had brushed it aside before.
A few unpublished lines she has penned creep in as do pictures of friends and family. Plus the one I read had an Afterword which was written a year after the book was finished and brings in a bit about Tammy and the new life.

This book takes the image of the perfect lives of the rich and famous and tears it apart to show a real human beneath it all.
A wonderful book that will add more meaning to the music and one I recommend with 10 stars.

Amazing...
I hate biographies. They usually contain too much completely boring information. This autobiography was more like sitting down over a coffee and listening to someone be completely open.

Melissa describes her life growing up in small-town America and reveals very personal parts of her life. She tells of her struggles with her relationships and with her family regarding her sexual orientation.

She's very frank about her relationships with people. She's also very passionate and fair in her descriptions of them... in many cases, she may be too fair to people who probably don't deserve it.

All in all, a pleasing (if quick) read. A candid and fascinating memoire by a passionate and enduring figure who deserves every ounce of respect she gets.

This book will make you a fan.
I bought this book as an on/off Melissa Etheridge fan - I had Breakdown and I listened to it on and off but I never felt the urge to go out and buy all her previous albums. This book changed that. The insight Melissa provides into her songwriting is more than enough to make you want to hear the songs she's talking about. She writes down the lyrics but obviously that's no substitute for the real thing. This was the main thing I took away from the book. It was also interesting to see how her various relationships have affected her writing. Of course, there's a reason why she called the book 'My Life in Love and Music.'