Top of the Rock: Inside the Rise and Fall of Must See TV by Warren Littlefield with T.R. Pearson
Former NBC Entertainment president Littlefield's loving look back at the network's dominance from the late '80s through the '90s is less a memoir than a gossipy fun oral history. Particularly winning are the chapters on Friends and Frasier, both of which deal insightfully with the burdens — as well as benefits — of success. (Doubleday, 336 pages)
The Richard Burton Diaries by Richard Burton and edited by Chris Williams
The Revolution Was Televised: The Cops, Crooks, Slingers and Slayers Who Changed TV Drama Forever by Alan Sepinwall
The celebrated TV critic looks at 12 of the shows — from Oz to Friday Night Lights to Breaking Bad — responsible for the small screen's current golden age. Surprisingly, Sepinwall couldn't find a publisher willing to give him a decent deal on the book, so he decided to self-publish it. The result? Rave reviews in the New York Times and from THR's chief TV critic Tim Goodman and strong sales. (Self-published, alansepinwall.com for information.)
Life After Death by Damien Echols
Echols was one of the West Memphis Three — teenagers arrested and convicted of the 1993 murder of three 8-year-old boys. The conviction was a miscarriage of justice, with erroneous testimony and hysteria that tried to link the crime to rock music. The case became a cause celebre in Hollywood, with documentaries West of Memphis (produced by Peter Jackson) and the Paradise Lost trilogy helping win their release. In the book, Echols tells his story with moving prose, insight and a surprising absence of rancor. A powerfully good memoir. (Penguin, 416 pages)
Waging Heavy Peace by Neil Young
The celebrated solo artist and member of Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young tells his story in this rambling, unconventional but ultimately winning book. Young's willingness to ditch the conventions of the rock memoir (or at least be self-aware of them) and his unique voice made this the most interesting, though at times frustrating, autobiographies of the year. (Blue Rider Press, 512 pages)
Girl Walks into a Bar . . . Comedy Calamities, Dating Disasters, and a Midlife Miracle by Rachel Dratch
In this year in which female comedians seemed to be everywhere, somehow former Saturday Night Live star Dratch's funny, moving memoir of becoming a mother at 44 slipped under the radar. That's a pity because her book deserves a place alongside Tina Fey's Bossypants, Mindy Kaling's Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? and Hilary Winston's My Boyfriend Wrote a Book About Me. (Gotham, 272 pages)
My Cross to Bear by Gregg Allman with Alan Light
The founding member of the legendary Allman Brothers Band and the former husband of Cher finally opens up about his late brother Duane, that famous marriage and his hard-living ways. (William Morrow, 390 pages)
When It Happens to You: A Novel in Stories by Molly Ringwald
The then-teenage star of Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club and Pretty in Pink showed a surprising dexterity as a fiction writer in this collection of short stories. The name might have led people to pick up the book, but the talent kept them reading to the end. (It Books, 256 pages)
Where'd You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple
An ex-Arrested Development writer, Semple produced one of the most clever and fun novels of the year. Told through a variety of forms — e-mails, police reports, notes — a teenage girl goes in search of her mother, who disappeared on the eve of a trip to Antarctica. Like Arrested Development, no logline or simple description can capture the pleasures of this book. (Little Brown, 336 pages)
Do the Movies Have a Future? by David Denby
The celebrated New Yorker film critic offered a thought-provoking meditation on the business and art of moviemaking and its future in a digital age. (Simon & Schuster, 368 pages)
The Big Screen: The Story of the Movies by David Thomson
Denby's book is well-paired with British film critic and historian Thomson's survey of the full history of film, from its rise in the early 20th century through its midcentury dominance to what he sees as its long, slow decline. (Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 608 pages)
We Killed: The Rise of Women in American Comedy by Yael Kohen
The past couple of years have seemed like a golden age of female comedians — Tina Fey, Mindy Kaling, Amy Poehler and Kristin Wiig, for starters — and Kohen’s oral history tells us the story of pioneers from Phyllis Diller and Elaine May to Carol Burnett, Lily Tomlin and Gilda Radner.(Sarah Crichton Books, 336 pages)