tell-all book
- noun
- /ˈtɛlˌɔl bʊk/
- Literature
- He had this plan to finish up his twenty years, get out quickly with a pension, and, having made good contacts with a woman who was a literary agent in New York, he was going to write a tell-all book.
- write a tell-all book
- new tell-all book
- controversial tell-all book
I'm I mentioned the name of Michael Cohen's Tell All book.
- I'm I mentioned the name of Michael Cohen's Tell All book.
Examples
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In his tell-all book, the celebrity disclosed personal struggles and challenges that his fans never knew about.
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I would love to have Obama write a tell-all book once his service is over in 2016.
Blog text (12) -
In a few years, I feel a tell-all book about this showmance will get published.
Blog text (9) -
This one's from Jacob Tomsky, a former hotel housekeeper who wrote a tell all book about the secrets of the hotel business.
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Aldous Snow's father and former manager, Jonathan Snow, has written a tell-all book.
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It will probably be an ex-employee, a pretend ex-employee, or Summit will hire someone to write the tell-all book.
Blog text (9) -
What about that tell-all book written by your ex-fiancée, Judy Kroll--
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The former politician's tell-all book revealed shocking details about his time in office.
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After years of silence, she finally published her tell-all book, exposing secrets from her past.
Synonyms
A true story someone writes about events from their own life
How Revealing
Surface Forms
Morphology
tell-all + book
The meaning of 'tell-all book' is directly compositional: 'tell-all' (to tell everything or reveal secrets) modifies 'book', yielding a book that reveals private or previously unknown information. This follows a productive English compounding pattern and would be readily inferable by a B1 learner who knows 'tell' and 'all', so the expression is transparent.
Etymology
The noun tell-all book comes from the simple image of someone telling all their secrets in a book, like they 'reveal everything' on the pages. That's why it means 'a book that reveals private or secret information'.