Showing titles in Entertainment & Celebrities

The future looks bleak. The present feels hopeless. Yet, for two young African-American brothers from the slums of New York City, failure is not an option. Experience a once-in-a-lifetime, true story of how courage, desperation, and a love for Hip-Hop shaped music history. Author Kenny Parker is the renowned deejay for the groundbreaking Hip-Hop act Boogie Down Productions. He provides a first-hand account detailing how he and his older brother, the iconic rapper KRS-One, escaped crime, extreme poverty, brutal violence, and betrayal to carve out an unparalleled musical legacy.

THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW EDITORS' CHOICE A book that explores the great American novelist and playwright Edna Ferber, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Ficton, whose work was made into many Academy Award-winning movies; the writing of her controversial, international best-selling novel...

Parks and Recreation actor Nick Offerman shares his humorous fulminations on life, manliness, meat, and much more in his first book. Growing a perfect moustache, grilling red meat, wooing a woman—who better to deliver this tutelage than the always charming, always manly Nick Offerman, best...

Jess Oppenheimer, "the brains" behind I Love Lucy, weaves this wonderfully entertaining tale of how his life experiences led him to create the iconic sitcom. Packed with humorous behind-the-scenes stories of stars like Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, William Frawley, Jack Benny, Douglas Fairbanks, and Fred Astaire.

From the acclaimed musician comes a tender, surprising, and often uproarious memoir about his dirt-poor southeast Texas boyhood. The only child of a hard-drinking father and a Holy Roller mother, Rodney Crowell was no stranger to bombast from an early age, whether knock-down-drag-outs at a local...

History called on Harry Truman to unite the Western world against Soviet communism, but first he had to rally Republicans and Democrats behind America’s most dramatic foreign policy shift since George Washington delivered his farewell address. How did one of the least prepared presidents to...

Tom Scharpling is good at being funny, which is a miracle, considering what he’s survived. Like hitting a deer and narrowly escaping with his life on the night of the 2016 election. But that’s nothing compared to the struggles he had earlier in his life. It Never Ends is his memoir of a life writing comedy amidst a lifelong struggle with mental illness, a story he has never told before. It’s the heartbreaking account of his intense coming-of-age, and the lengths he’s undertaken to pull away from the brink of self-destruction.

"Thoughtfully traces [Mara Wilson's] journey from child actress to Hollywood dropout...Who is she now? She's a writer." —NPR's "Guide To 2016’s Great Reads" “Growing up, I wanted to be Mara Wilson. Where Am I Now? is a delight.” —Ilana Glazer, cocreator and star of Broad City Named a...

The original edition of this revered and authorized Queen biography explored every aspect of the legendary group’s career from inception to 1992. Newly revised and updated with cooperation and insight from Brian May and Roger Taylor—and drawing on exclusive interviews with the bandmembers—this book completes the story of the Mercury era and the immediate years after his death.

Told with humor and flair, this is the autobiography of one transsexual's wild ride from boyhood as Alfred Brevard ("Buddy") Crenshaw in rural Tennessee to voluptuous female entertainer in Hollywood. Aleshia Brevard, as she is now known, underwent transitional surgery in Los Angeles in 1962, one of the first such operations in the United States. (The famous sexual surgery pioneer Harry Benjamin himself broke the news to Brevard's parents.)

From the earliest days of silent films and the swinging era of the Roaring Twenties, through the Golden Age of the studio system and the patriotic call of WWII, to the Red Scare paranoia of the McCarthy years, the history of the Schenck brothers is the story of Hollywood itself—and the enduring power of the American Dream. Moguls is a must-listen for film fans, history buffs, and anyone who loves the movies.

Biography of Bernard "Pretty" Purdie, the world's most recorded drummer. Bernard Pretty Purdie is arguably the most recorded drummer in the world. He hit the New York music scene in the early 1960 s, and landed his first hit with Mickey and Sylvia the beginning of a stellar career. This led to his 25-year association with Aretha Franklin. Purdie has been a regular guest in the studios of the stars of Jazz, Soul and Rock, working together with Lonnie Youngblood, King Curtis, Les Cooper, Paul Butterfield, Larry Coryell, Miles Davis, Hall & Oates, Al Kooper, Herbie Mann, Todd Rundgren and Cat ...

NAMED ONE OF AMAZON EDITORS' BEST BOOKS OF JULY! From the New York Times bestselling Kennedy historian and author of Jackie: Public, Private, Secret comes the other side of the story—her husband’s: JFK: Public, Private, Secret. In this definitive portrait of John Fitzgerald Kennedy—one of...

Joyce Bulifant has lived the "Hollywood life" for nearly seven decades, and through it, experienced what few outside the entertainment world can imagine. While following the path of her own successful career, Ms. Bulifant managed to navigate the choppy waters of her husbands' alcoholism, codependency, and an extended family of four marriages.

Ten years after her death, Princess Diana remains a mystery. Was she “the people’s princess,” who electrified the world with her beauty and humanitarian missions? Or was she a manipulative, media-savvy neurotic who nearly brought down the monarchy? Only Tina Brown, former editor-in-chief...

This program is read by the author. "Kindhearted and approachable Winkler shines in his narration of his memoir commemorating 50 years of showbiz work...An engaging and endearing memoir by a genuine Hollywood treasure whose work spans generations."—Library Journal From Emmy-award winning actor...

At eight years old, Ricky Ian Gordon pulled The Victor Book of Opera off his piano teacher’s bookshelf, and his world shifted on its axis. Though scandal, sadness, and confusion would shake that world over the next few decades, its polestar remained constant. Music has been the guiding force of Gordon’s life; through it, he has been able not only to survive great sorrow but also to capture the depths of his emotion in song. It is this strength, this technical and visceral genius, that has made him one of our generation’s greatest composers.

Just what was it about the Grateful Dead that made them rock and roll's most beloved band? In Deadheads, those with the real story, who were there and are still listening to the music, explain it all. Grateful Dead lyricist John Perry Barlow talks about his lifelong friendship with Dead guitarist Bob Weir. Cajun chef Rick Begneaud shares his memories of feeding the Dead. John Popper of Blues Traveler recalls playing with the Dead at Bill Graham's memorial tribute .

John Lennon 1980 traces the powerful, life-affirming story of the former Beatle’s remarkable comeback after five years of self-imposed retirement. Lennon’s final pivotal year would climax in several moments of creative triumph as he rediscovered his artistic self in dramatic fashion. With the bravura release of the Double Fantasy album with wife, Yoko Ono, he was poised and ready for an even brighter future only to be wrenched from the world by an assassin’s bullets.

This meticulously researched audiobook explores the concept of fame in all its fleeting glory and confounding inconsistency. Why do so many entertainers do so much better financially than peers who have comparable resumes? Author Donald Jeffries also examines a subject he is quite familiar with: the myriad of unnatural deaths which have plagued the entertainment industry since the dawn of Hollywood. The deaths of John Lennon, Elvis Presley, Marilyn Monroe, Natalie Wood, and many others are scrutinized in exacting detail.