I enjoyed reading this biography of Joan Rivers. The humour was so good and kept me engaged till the very end.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and Joan Rivers' wry sense of humor comes across on every page. At times heart-breaking, at times hilarious, she details a richly lived life, filled with family and famous friends. Her self-deprecating humor is always a delight. Highly recommend.

Joan Rivers was a larger-than-life comedian known for pushing boundaries - and frequently violating them. In "Last Girl Before Freeway," Leslie Bennetts weaves well-chosen anecdotes and reflections from Rivers' contemporaries into a humanizing account of a tenacious, ambitious and ferociously energetic woman. Entertaining, and perhaps slightly more sympathetic than Rivers deserved.

Great read. I love Joan Rivers, and Bennetts tells this story with heart and humor

Thank you to Net Galley and Little, Brown and Co for an e-Arc of this title, in exchange for my honest review. Joan Rivers was always a bit abrasive for my taste, but I felt like there might be more to the woman. I enjoyed the book, but it confirmed that she was mean spirited. What I admired was her rise during a time that women weren't welcome in the world of comedy, and she really persevered. There was quite a bit of repetition, although the writing was good. I would've loved to see more actual interviews with people, and that the book had been written based on those.

I would recommend this for fans of Rivers or people who want a picture of what being a female comedian in the mid 20th century was like.

found the story of Joan Rivers fascinating. She was a feminist who had a traditional marriage and a trend-setter who decorated her home like Louis XVI. I loved reading about her many struggles and sympathized with her.

My only disappointment with this book is the ending. I'm not a "spiritual" person. I don't believe in ghosts and visitations. The interviews with her friends who visited psychics after Joan's death made me question the rest of the book. If these are the same friends who supplied other details in the book, how reliable is that information?

The rest of the book seemed solid, intelligent and well-researched. I highly recommend it, just skip the very end.

I received this book from Netgalley in exchange for a fair review.

Given her place in history, there are very few books about Joan Rivers written by anyone other than Joan, she alone, seemed to control her narrative. One of the few outliers is the heartwarming book by daughter Melissa after her death. Joan was the one who chronicled the stories and the rumors (not always truthfully), who poked fun at herself, and addressed every elephant in the room. I was sure the first book written about her following her death by an outsider would be a salacious skewering of a lightning-rod kind of woman who inspired as much derision as adulation. I thought the critics would want to take their shot at her, since she wasn’t around to aim back with her acid-tinged tongue. Fortunately, this book is astonishingly balanced, showing her in her most human terms. She had her good points, her bad points and behaviors, she failed as people do, albeit on a grand scale, but her rebound was well-earned, and you won’t begrudge her one iota of the sweetness of it. I believe that people who were not fans will walk away, if not in love, with a knowledgeable respect for her, and those that were fans, will have a greater depth of understanding of how she earned the term ‘legend’. Closing the book, you realize what we really lost in Joan Rivers: a true broad (I love a ballsy and bawdy broad), with a spine of steel and a heart of gold hidden behind her viciously snarky tone.

I love celebrity biographies and memoirs, and I've always been curious about Joan Rivers, so I was eager to read this. I should have skipped it, to be honest. Unfortunately, Last Girl Before Freeway: The Life, Loves, Losses, and Liberation of Joan Rivers was boring and repetitive, even with such a vibrant subject.

As a fellow Jew from the NYC area, I've always had a soft spot for Joan Rivers. While I enjoyed learning more about her family relationships and how she evolved as a comedian, I couldn't get past the dull, uninspiring writing. It seemed as though the author simply copy and pasted previous stories about Joan Rivers, and did so with contempt. There was a negative vibe that permeated throughout the story, and it left me with a sour feeling.

This story in no way did Joan Rivers justice, and it needed a few more passes with an editor to make it readable, IMO.

*Copy provided in exchange for an honest review*

Having never read anything about Joan Rivers I found this to be a fascinating read.
It certainly shows how focused and determined she was to succeed.

This book talks about the real Joan Rivers, from day one. The tough, smart Joan who set a goal for herself when she was young, and would let nothing or no one stand in her way. Joan fought her way to the top, scratching and crawling, working in a man's world, to succeed. And she did, she was funny, and she was original, and she had moxie. Joan was fearless. She finally married, had her beautiful daughter Melissa, only to be betrayed by Edgar, who lost all her hard-earned money in bad investments, and took the cowards way out by suicide. Joan was indeed devastated, both emotionally and financially. But she did it one and she'd do again, from scratch. And she did. There's so much more about Joan Rivers you should know. So, I highly recommend this book.

I absolutely loved this book! I have always loved Joan Rivers for her sense of humor and her have-no-fear attitude. I always thought there was more to her than meets the idea, but I really had no clue just how true this was. She was an incredibly brave, complicated, unique woman.