William J Mann

Tinseltown: Murder, Morphine, and Madness at the Dawn of Hollywood William J Mann

Publisher Marketing:"The Day of the Locust" meets "The Devil in the White City" and "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil "in this juicy, untold Hollywood story: an addictive true account of ambition, scandal, intrigue, murder, and the creation of the modern film industry. By 1920, the movies had suddenly become America s new favorite pastime and one of the nation s largest industries. Never before had a medium possessed such power to influence; yet Hollywood s glittering ascendancy was threatened by a string of headline-grabbing tragedies including the murder of William Desmond Taylor, the popular president of the Motion Picture Directors Association, a legendary crime that has remained unsolved until now. In a fiendishly involving narrative, bestselling Hollywood chronicler William J. Mann draws on a rich host of sources, including recently released FBI files, to uncover the story of the enigmatic Taylor and the diverse group of people who surrounded him including three beautiful, ambitious actresses; a grasping stage mother; a devoted valet; and a gang of two-bit thugs, any of whom might have fired the fatal bullet. And overseeing this entire landscape of intrigue was Adolph Zukor, the brilliant and ruthless founder of Paramount Pictures, locked in a struggle for control of the industry and desperate to conceal the truth about the crime. Along the way, Mann brings to life Los Angeles in the Roaring Twenties: a sparkling yet schizophrenic town filled with party girls, drug dealers, religious zealots, newly minted legends, and starlets already past their prime a dangerous place where the powerful could still run afoul of the desperate. A true story recreated with the suspense of a novel, "Tinseltown" is the work of a storyteller at the peak of his powers and the solution to a crime that has stumped detectives and historians for nearly a century." Review Citations: Publishers Weekly 08/04/2014 pg. 41 (EAN 9780062242167, Hardcover) - *Starred Review Kirkus Reviews 09/15/2014 (EAN 9780062242167, Hardcover) - *Starred Review Booklist 10/01/2014 pg. 12 (EAN 9780062242167, Hardcover) Library Journal 10/15/2014 pg. 107 (EAN 9780062242167, Hardcover) Entertainment Weekly 10/31/2014 pg. 68 (EAN 9780062242167, Hardcover) Contributor Bio:  Mann, William J William J. Mann is the author of Kate: The Woman Who Was Hepburn; How to Be a Movie Star: Elizabeth Taylor in Hollywood; Hello, Gorgeous: Becoming Barbra Streisand; and Wisecracker: The Life and Times of William Haines, which won the 1999 Lambda Literary Award. He divides his time between Connecticut and Cape Cod. Contributor Bio:  Lane, Christopher Christopher Lane is a prolific writer who has published 15 books for the inspirational and religious market, including six children's novels, one of which won the Gold Medallion Award and another the C. S. Lewis Award. He continues to write for the Christian market. This first mystery is his debut in the American Booksellers market. He lives in Colorado Springs, Colorado.