PERHAPS the most startling thing about Casey Donovan's new tell-all book is that 10,000 words were cut out in the editing process.
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The book, titled Big, Beautiful and Sexy, explicitly goes into great detail about her life after winning Australian Idol.
She exposes intimate details about her six-year relationship with her ghost of a boyfriend, who turns out to be her best friend whom she has a lesbian relationship with.
There's also the physical brawl with her dad in a blues bar and the time she got punched in the face in a Coogee pub after taking speed.
Donovan said writing the book was therapeutic but she was nervous before its release.
"When it came out I didn't expect it to explode like it did," Donovan said.
"I had been wanting to write a book for a while; it was exciting and nerve-racking at the same time."
Donovan said there were a few heated discussions between her and her family about what exactly was to go into the book. In the end, she won the support she needed.
"It's good to have my darkest secrets out there but there's still some stuff I've left out. There's some legal hurdles you have to go through when you publish but I've tried to keep it honest as possible. It was very hard, re-living all of the heartache."
Donovan gives the woman who catfished her a fake name - "Olga". Olga befriends Donovan soon after winning the Australian Idol crown, posing as the mate of a man she randomly spoke to on the phone.
She gained the trust of Donovan, eventually convincing her to have sex with her, while secretly posing as her boyfriend on the phone for years.
With the saga now behind her, Donovan hopes to reclaim the stage this year and get her music career back on track.
On the back of the release of her book and the 10-year anniversary of her Australia Idol win she's touring the country with her show You Believed: 10 Year Anniversary.
She will also jet over to Glasgow for the Commonwealth Games to perform as part of the multinational cast for The Boomerang Project.
With artists from Gaelic, Aboriginal and Maori cultures, visitors to the Games will experience the unusual musical fusion of bagpipes, didgeridoo and haka chants.
In the meantime, she will be performing up and down the east coast.
■ Casey Donovan will perform at Lizotte's Newcastle on Thursday, June 19. Tickets are available at newcastle.lizottes.com.au or by phoning 4956 2066.
