Party of One

From former MTV VJ Dave Holmes the hilarious memoir of a perpetual outsider fumbling towards self-acceptance with the music of the '80s '90s and today as his soundtrack   Dave Holmes has spent his life on the periphery nose pressed hopefully against the glass wanting just one thing: to get inside. Growing up he was the artsy son in the sporty family. At his all-boys high school and Catholic college he was the closeted gay kid surrounded by crush-worthy straight guys. And in his twenties in the middle of a disastrous career in advertising he accidentally became an MTV VJ overnight when he finished second naturally in the Wanna Be a VJ contest opening the door to fame fortune and celebrity—you know almost. . In Party of One Holmes tells the hilariously painful and painfully hilarious tales—in the vein of Rob Sheffield Andy Cohen and Paul Feig—of an outsider desperate to get in of a misfit constantly changing shape of a music geek who finally learns to accept himself. Structured around a mix of hits and deep cuts from the last four decades—from Bruce Springsteen's Hungry Heart and En Vogue's Free Your Mind to LCD Soundsystem’s “Losing My Edge” and Bleachers’ “I Wanna Get Better”—and punctuated with interludes like So You've Had Your Heart Broken in the 1990s: A Playlist and “Notes on (Jesse) Camp” this book is for anyone who's ever felt like a square peg especially those who have found their place in the world around a band an album or a song. It's a laugh-out-loud funny deeply nostalgic story about never fitting in never giving up and letting good music guide the way.. – NPR “Best Books of 2016”: Staff Picks Biography & Memoir For Music Lovers Funny Stuff Non-fiction Categories