“I’ve had nightmares every night for the past three months because I’m scared to be this vulnerable with people,” Mr. Van Ness said.

For much of the summer, Mr. Van Ness, 32, has been mentally preparing himself for the release of his piercing memoir, “Over the Top,” on Sept. 24, in which a different image of Mr. Van Ness unspools with remarkable transparency.

[The book is on our nonfiction best-seller list.]

Subtitled a “Raw Journey to Self-Love,” the book doesn’t so much explode as offer psychological insight into the hirsute gay fairy godmother in heels or, as he puts it, “the effervescent, gregarious majestic center-part-blow-dry cotton-candy figure-skating queen” that he portrays on “Queer Eye.”

“It’s hard for me to be as open as I want to be when there are certain things I haven’t shared publicly,” he said. He cracked his knuckles as he fidgeted from nerves. “These are issues that need to be talked about.”

He ordered another cup of coffee, his fifth of the day, and began tearing up as he spoke about a particularly painful memory, one of many that he divulges in his book. When he was much younger, he was abused by an older boy from church, during what was supposed to be a make-believe play session.