This Is Country: A Backstage Pass to the Academy of Country Music Awards by Lisa Lee, transports the reader to the very first informal awards ceremony in 1963 at the Red Barrel Nightclub in California all the way through this year's 49th live broadcast at Las Vegas' MGM Grand Garden Arena complete with invitations, ticket stubs, photographs and personal anecdotes from the artists and hosts.

In the forward, Reba McEntire confesses her nerves when she hosted, as well as her joy in sharing hosting duties with Blake Shelton. "I can honestly say that Blake Shelton had to be the most fun cohost," she writes. "My strait-laced face and his little naughty 14-year-old boy attitude proved to be a winning combination."

Other highlights include Loretta Lynn's take on making history by being the first woman named Entertainer of the Year in 1975 and gushing after she met her childhood crush, Roy Rogers, at one of the awards shows. "I was the first woman who stepped out and said things that shouldn't have been said. I didn't realize that I was saying anything I shouldn't be saying," she writes. "I just wrote the songs and sang them thinking, 'Hey, this is life. Everybody's lived it.' But I found out different. You don't talk about some of the life you live."