Brad Goreski‘s memoir Born to be Brad hit shelves yesterday (he’s doing a signing at 5pm tonight at the FIT Barnes & Noble) and you’re not alone in thinking there’s no way Brad is old enough to be writing his memoir. We thought the same thing until we read it–and as it turns out, Brad has lived a pretty full life–perhaps even two of them.

And as of today, that life is literally an open book–and a pretty juicy one at that. From his difficulties growing up gay in a small Canadian town, to a period of excessive partying, to being a 24-year-old Vogue intern, to becoming the assistant to a huge celebrity stylist and a reality TV star in one felll swoop, to how that job came to an end, he doesn’t really leave anything out. And he clears up a lot of those rumors.

We learned so much about the celebrity stylist-slash-reality television star that we almost didn’t know what to ask him the other day when we chatted on the phone. Of course, we managed to find some good stuff to talk about.

Click through for the 10 most interesting things we learned about the It’s a Brad, Brad World star from his shiny new book, followed by a Q+A in which he discusses making it in the industry, still feeling like an outsider, his backup dancer ambitions and how his boyfriend Gary is amazing–not that we didn’t already know that.

1) He became addicted to cocaine and alcohol while in college in Toronto. In 2001, he got sober and still is to this day.

2) He originally wanted, and went to school, to become an actor. When he realized that wasn’t what he wanted to do, he tried modeling.

3) His boyfriend Gary, who he met in Greece while working with a Greek modeling agency, was the one who suggested he go into fashion.

4) He almost didn’t accept Rachel Zoe’s job offer because he was told he would be part of a reality show and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to be on television.

5) He got “blacklisted” from Condé Nast because he took Rachel’s job offer after working at the west coast office of Vogue for only three months–meaning he’d never be able to work for a Condé Nast publication again.

6) By chance, Brad and Gary were on vacation in St. Barth’s at the same time as Rachel and Rodger, before Brad was slated to start his job with her. Rachel made Brad leave his vacation early to do a last minute styling job, which he was happy to do, but…red flag?

7) This isn’t about Brad per se, but Taylor would yell at the camera people when they first started filming The Rachel Zoe Project, telling them the show wasn’t going to be interesting.

8) Brad is really glad he took his clothes off for Terry Richardson. An excerpt from that experience:

“You have a really nice biceps [sic],” he said. “What’s your body like underneath your shirt? Take your shirt off.”
I hesitated but then did it.
“You have abs man!” Terry said. “Who would have known?”

9) When he left Rachel Zoe, he gave Rachel and Rodger two months notice and expected to stay friends with Rachel after he left.

10) He lost money on his first job post-Rachel, which he got because Rachel was too pregnant. It was to style Jake Gyllenhaal and Anne Hathaway for the cover of Entertainment Weekly, but he did not “poach” Anne Hathaway.

Keep reading for our interview with Brad…