My Name is Barbra

'I have been patiently waiting for Barbra Streisand’s autobiography for 54 years….My Name is Barbra is a Streisand obsessive’s dream come true. It addresses all the rumours and misrepresentations of her long and extraordinary life, from nearly missing out on A Star is Born to dating Pierre Trudeau, Omar Sharif and Marlon Brando. The wait has been worth every word!' * Richard E Grant, Sunday Times *
A brilliant memoir * Hillary Clinton *
This enormous, poignant memoir from the ultimate showbusiness trouper shows that you can never have it all (even if you’re Barbra). The writing is great and the likeable formidable personality shines through . . . deeper than the average celebrity memoir * The Times *
The book is crammed with delicious details of backstage arguments, bewildered suitors and at least one incident of falling off a London bus * BBC *
Chatty, candid, a 970-page victory lap past all who ever doubted, diminished or dissed her, with lingering high fives for the many supporters . . . generous dollops of chutzpah … Nobody put Barbra in the corner. There are just so many scintillating Streisands to contemplate over so many years: singer, actress, director, producer, philanthropist, activist, lover, mother, wife, friend, autobiographer. . . There’s something exuberant and glorious about Streisand’s photo dump of self-portraits and party pics. Indeed about this whole dragged-out banquet of a book. You might not have the appetite to linger for the whole thing, but you’ll find something worth a nosh * New York Times *
Streisand is no less than a living legend, one of a handful of EGOT winners (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony) and now, she’s taking us all back to where it began. Streisand’s story is truly inspirational and it’s one that you’ll want to pick up again and again * Glamour *
An extraordinary life – you couldn’t make it up * The Guardian *
At heart this is a story so bursting with life, fury, unbelievable ambition and food (Streisand loves to eat) that you come away from it exhausted but smiling. “I was always an odd duck,” writes Streisand. “And I wanted to make it on my own terms. I didn’t want to change and pretend to be someone else.” She hardly needs more praise at this point, but hear hear! * The Guardian *
Exhilarating … leaves blood on the page … My Name Is Barbra is 992 pages of startling honesty and self-reflection, deadpan parenthetical asides (including a running bit about how much she loves going to the dentist), encyclopedic recall of onstage outfits, and rigorous analyses of her films * Vanity Fair *
‘Mystical, messy, bawdy and funny … My Name is Barbra confides her insecurities and a ravening hunger for fame…silent but eloquent and vociferous writing' * Peter Conrad, The Observer *