Celebrity

Melissa Rivers Penned Letter to Mother Joan Rivers, Her 'Tenant': 'I Love Having You Live with Me'

"You are an inspiration. You are also thirty days late with the rent," Melissa wrote to her mother

Published on April 7, 2015 06:40 PM

Melissa Rivers remembers her mother Joan Rivers not only as a sharp-tongued, witty matriarch and a famed comedian, but also as a diva tenant.

The 47-year-old television host penned a humorous letter to the Fashion Police star before her death – Joan Rivers died in September at 81. Melissa’s letter details the delights and downsides of cohabitating with her mom and her son Cooper, 14, in their Los Angeles home.

The letter was recently published in A Letter to My Mom, a book created by Lisa Erspamer that features letters from celebrities and non-celebrities alike who wrote notes of gratitude to the women who raised them. The book hit shelves Tuesday.

“Dear Mom, I received the note that you slipped under my bedroom door last night. I was very excited to read it, thinking that it would contain amazing, loving advice that you wanted to share with me,” Melissa begins.

The note is chock full of her family’s trademark humor: “While I appreciate your desire to ‘upgrade’ your accommodations to a larger space, I cannot, in good conscience, move Cooper into the laundry room,” she continues.

While Melissa goes on to request that Joan abide by her rules of not allowing chips and ice cream for dinner or throwing topless parties in her hot tub, she also closes the silly memo with a heartfelt message.

“I love having you live with me and am very grateful for every minute Cooper and I have with you,” Melissa writes. “You are an inspiration. You are also thirty days late with the rent.”

The letter also functioned as a eulogy during her mother’s private funeral service. And a lengthier written tribute is also on the horizon – a book titled The Book of Joan: Tales of Mirth, Mischief, and Manipulation.

The book shares funny anecdotes about Melissa and Joan’s mother-daughter relationship since childhood, as told by the person that knows the famed comic better than anyone.

“In our family we always believed that laughter was the best medicine,” Melissa told PEOPLE in February. “I wanted to write a book that would make my mother laugh.”

The Book of Joan: Tales of Mirth, Mischief, and Manipulation hits shelves May 5.

• Reporting by LIZ McNEIL