Author Guide · Memoir & Fiction
Books Written by
Carrie Fisher played Princess Leia in Star Wars at nineteen, and a decade later published Postcards from the Edge (1987), a semi-autobiographical novel about drug addiction. She wrote the screenplay for the 1990 film. She went on to write three more novels, worked for years as an uncredited script doctor in Hollywood, and turned her one-woman stage show Wishful Drinking into a memoir. In 2018, thirteen months after her death, the audiobook of The Princess Diarist, which she narrated, won the Grammy for Best Spoken Word Album. This guide covers her 7 key books, in order, and where to begin.
By Lisanne Swart · 7 key books · 1987–2016 · Updated October 2026
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Quick answer
Carrie Fisher wrote four novels and three memoirs. The best known are Postcards from the Edge (1987), Wishful Drinking (2008) and The Princess Diarist (2016). Start with Wishful Drinking, the shortest and most direct account of her life; read Postcards for her fiction.
Where to Start with Carrie Fisher
If you want her life, in her own voice
→ Wishful Drinking (2008) — the memoir that grew out of her stage show.
If you want her fiction
→ Postcards from the Edge (1987) — the 1987 novel she adapted for film.
If you want Star Wars
→ The Princess Diarist (2016) — her diaries from the set in 1976.
7 Carrie Fisher Books, in Order
Postcards from the Edge
A semi-autobiographical novel that satirises her own drug addiction of the late 1970s and her relationship with her mother, through a heroine named Suzanne. Columbia Pictures released the film in 1990, directed by Mike Nichols with Meryl Streep and Shirley MacLaine; Fisher wrote the screenplay, which was nominated for a BAFTA.
Surrender the Pink
Her second novel, published three years after Postcards from the Edge.
Delusions of Grandma
Her third novel.
The Best Awful There Is
Her fourth novel, a sequel to Postcards from the Edge, published seventeen years after it.
Wishful Drinking
A short memoir adapted from her one-woman stage show, which opened at the Geffen Playhouse in Los Angeles in November 2006 and ran on Broadway, at Studio 54, from October 2009 to January 2010. HBO broadcast a filmed performance in 2010, and her reading of the audiobook was nominated for a Grammy. It contains her famous request for how her death should be reported.
Shockaholic
Her second memoir, in which she writes about the electroconvulsive therapy she received, at one point every six weeks.
The Princess Diarist
Built around diaries she kept while filming Star Wars in 1976, when she was nineteen. The book reveals her three-month affair with Harrison Ford, then married, during the shoot. Published in November 2016, a month before her death; her reading of the audiobook won the Grammy for Best Spoken Word Album.
In What Order to Read Carrie Fisher
The memoirs read best in order of publication: Wishful Drinking began as her stage show, Shockaholic describes her electroconvulsive therapy, and The Princess Diarist goes back to 1976.
The novels stand alone, except that The Best Awful There Is is a sequel to Postcards from the Edge, so read Postcards first.
A reading path
1. Wishful Drinking (2008)
2. Postcards from the Edge (1987)
3. Shockaholic (2011)
4. The Princess Diarist (2016)
The years · 1956–2018
Quick facts about Carrie Fisher
- Known for
- Fisher is known as Princess Leia in Star Wars and as a writer whose novels and memoirs dealt openly and with humour with addiction and bipolar disorder.
- 1956
- Born in Burbank, California
- 1977
- Star Wars released
- 2008
- Wishful Drinking
- 2018
- Grammy for The Princess Diarist
- Born
- 21 October 1956, Burbank, California
- Died
- 27 December 2016, Los Angeles, aged 60
- Parents
- The actress Debbie Reynolds and the singer Eddie Fisher
- Screen
- Princess Leia in Star Wars (1977) and its sequels
- Script work
- Uncredited script doctor on films including Hook and Sister Act
- Awards
- Grammy for Best Spoken Word Album (2018); BAFTA nomination for the Postcards screenplay
The red mark is 1987: Postcards from the Edge, her first novel.
How Carrie Fisher Writes
Fisher’s writing is built on one-liners and self-mockery, applied to subjects most memoirs handle gravely: addiction, bipolar disorder, electroconvulsive therapy. The jokes do not soften the facts; she states them and then makes fun of herself for them.
Her novels are lightly fictionalised. Postcards from the Edge satirises her own addiction and her relationship with her mother; she later said of its heroine, “I’ve already played Suzanne.” Alongside the books she spent years polishing other writers’ screenplays, uncredited, from Hook to Sister Act.
The memoirs began as performance. Wishful Drinking was a stage show before it was a book, and The Princess Diarist sets her nineteen-year-old diary entries against her own commentary at sixty.
Watch
Carrie Fisher in 2004
Carrie Fisher in a CBS Sunday Morning profile first broadcast in February 2004.
Frequently asked questions about Carrie Fisher’s books
How many books did Carrie Fisher write?
Seven: four novels, Postcards from the Edge (1987), Surrender the Pink (1990), Delusions of Grandma (1993) and The Best Awful There Is (2004), and three memoirs, Wishful Drinking (2008), Shockaholic (2011) and The Princess Diarist (2016).
What are Carrie Fisher’s books in order?
Postcards from the Edge (1987), Surrender the Pink (1990), Delusions of Grandma (1993), The Best Awful There Is (2004), Wishful Drinking (2008), Shockaholic (2011) and The Princess Diarist (2016).
Where should I start with Carrie Fisher?
With Wishful Drinking (2008), the short memoir adapted from her stage show. For her fiction, start with Postcards from the Edge.
What is Carrie Fisher’s most famous book?
Postcards from the Edge (1987), her first novel, filmed in 1990 with Meryl Streep and Shirley MacLaine from her own screenplay.
Is Postcards from the Edge about Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds?
It is semi-autobiographical, drawing on her drug addiction of the late 1970s and her relationship with her mother, Debbie Reynolds. Fisher wrote the screenplay for the 1990 film, in which Shirley MacLaine plays the heroine’s mother.
What did The Princess Diarist reveal about Harrison Ford?
Fisher wrote that she and Harrison Ford, who was married at the time, had a three-month affair during the filming of Star Wars in 1976. The book includes her diary entries from that time.
Did Carrie Fisher narrate her audiobooks?
Yes. Her recording of The Princess Diarist won the Grammy for Best Spoken Word Album in 2018, and her Wishful Drinking audiobook was nominated in 2009.
When did Carrie Fisher die?
On 27 December 2016 at UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles, four days after a medical emergency on a flight from London. The Los Angeles County coroner could not determine the exact cause and named sleep apnoea and a build-up of fatty deposits in the artery walls among the contributing factors.
Was Wishful Drinking a show or a book?
Both. It began as a one-woman show at the Geffen Playhouse in 2006, became a book in 2008, ran on Broadway in 2009–2010 and was filmed by HBO in 2010.
Footnotes
- Carrie Fisher — Wikipedia
- The Princess Diarist — Wikipedia
- Carrie Fisher opens up about Star Wars and her on-set affair — NPR Fresh Air, 2016
- Carrie Fisher wrote her own obit in 2008 — ET
- Wishful Drinking — Wikipedia
Bibliography last verified 9 October 2026. Where sources give different first-publication years, this page uses the year in library catalogues or the publisher’s own record.
This list was not put together by a machine.
The notes are all mine,
and the books are all his.
Lisanne x
Written by Lisanne Swart, who has curated reading lists and author guides at lisanneswart.com since 2021.
See more on her personal bookshelf.
“No matter how I go, I want it reported that I drowned in moonlight, strangled by my own bra.”
— Carrie Fisher, Wishful Drinking (2008)
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