Anthony Woodz Diaz has dreams of Hollywood, but his dreams will be more like nightmares as he struggles to overcome adversities living in the slums of New York City. With just his single mom, disconnected siblings, and no positive father figure, Anthony takes matters into his own hands and turns to the streets of Spanish Harlem for guidance and shelter. Just when the troubled teen seems to be getting his turbulent life in order, his dreams of Hollywood are shattered for good, and he is forced to say good-bye to Hollywood.
When she's hired to adapt the blockbuster novel, Beautiful Darkness, for film, screenwriter Jessica Yates sees an opportunity she can't pass up. The only thing standing between her and a guaranteed hit movie is the author. Lynn Baldwin's rise from Midwestern housewife to literary superstardom has gone straight to her head, and she's not willing to see her creation hit the screen without her total approval. As the entire creative team struggles with the hard-to-please author, Jessica's personal life spins out of control. When there's more relationship drama and kinky sex off the page than on, she's forced to reevaluate what she really wants-before Beautiful Darkness destroys her Hollywood dreams forever.
New York Times bestselling author C.J. Box's novels have been called "red hot" (Booklist) and "edge-of-your-seat read[s]" (Omaha World-Herald). Now he delivers a novel that will steal your sleep as much as it will wrench your heart. Three Weeks to Say Goodbye is a novel about something that could be anyone's worst nightmare. . . Jack and Melissa McGuane have spent years trying to have a baby. Finally their dream has come true with the adoption of their daughter, Angelina. But nine months after bringing her home, they receive a devastating phone call... Angelina's birth father, a teenager, never signed away his parental rights—and he wants her back. Worse, his father, a powerful Denver judge, will use every trick in the book to make sure it happens. The McGuanes attempt to meet face-to-face with the father and son...but soon it becomes clear that there's something sinister about their motivations—and that love for Angelina is not one of them. A horrifying game of intimidation and double crosses begins that quickly becomes a death spiral where everyone is suspect and no one is safe. Now Jack and Melissa will stop at nothing to protect their child—even though time is running out... C.J. Box has once again written a bone-chilling thriller that will keep you guessing until the very last page.
American policing is in crisis. Here, award-winning investigative journalist Joe Domanick reveals the troubled history of American policing over the past quarter century. He begins in the early 1990s with the beating of Rodney King and the L.A. riots, when the Los Angeles Police Department was caught between a corrupt and racist past and the demands of a rapidly changing urban population. Across the country, American cities faced similar challenges to law and order. In New York, William J. Bratton was spearheading the reorganization of the New York City Transit Police and later the 35,000-strong New York Police Department. His efforts resulted in a dramatic decrease in crime, yet introduced highly controversial policing strategies. In 2002, when Bratton was named the LAPD's new chief, he implemented the lessons learned in New York to change a department that previously had been impervious to reform. Blue ends in 2015 with the LAPD on its unfinished road to reform, as events in Los Angeles, New York, Baltimore, and Ferguson, Missouri, raise alarms about the very strategies Bratton pioneered, and about aggressive racial profiling and the militarization of police departments throughout the United States. Domanick tells his story through the lives of the people who lived it. Along with Bratton, he introduces William Parker, the legendary LAPD police chief; Tom Bradley, the first black mayor of Los Angeles; and Charlie Beck, the hard-nosed ex-gang cop who replaced Bratton as LAPD chief. The result is both intimate and expansive: a gripping narrative that asks big questions about what constitutes good and bad policing and how best to prevent crime, control police abuse, and ease tensions between the police and the powerless. Blue is not only a page-turning read but an essential addition to our scholarship.--Adapted from book jacket.
"I mean, it's not as if I want a father. I have a father. It's just that I don't know who he is or where he is. But I have one." Ramiro Lopez and Jake Upthegrove don't appear to have much in common. Ram lives in the Mexican-American working-class barrio of El Paso called "Dizzy Land." His brother is sinking into a world of drugs, wreaking havoc in their household. Jake is a rich West Side white boy who has developed a problem managing his anger. An only child, he is a misfit in his mother's shallow and materialistic world. But Ram and Jake do have one thing in common: They are lost boys who have never met their fathers. This sad fact has left both of them undeniably scarred and obsessed with the men who abandoned them. As Jake and Ram overcome their suspicions of each other, they begin to move away from their loner existences and realize that they are capable of reaching out beyond their wounds and the neighborhoods that they grew up in. Their friendship becomes a healing in a world of hurt. San Antonio Express-News wrote, "Benjamin Alire Sáenz exquisitely captures the mood and voice of a community, a culture, and a generation"; that is proven again in this beautifully crafted novel.
Can an average girl survive Hollywood? Ally Valenti doesn’t belong in Hollywood. Not like her friend and actress, Lena Lyons. Lena’s convinced Ally to pursue her dreams of fashion design, starting with some gowns for the awards season. Which Ally will get around to creating as soon as she can stop looking at Jacob Swan, Lena’s latest co-star. Not that she’s staring. Ally’s skeptical of anything celebrity and it’s not like she’d be pathetic enough to fall for a Hollywood heartthrob. Then Ally learns there’s more to Jacob than his good-guy, all-American persona. She finds herself torn between the desire to get to know him better and her determination to stay out of the limelight. Of course the media has other ideas—and someone doesn’t like all the attention Ally’s getting. When threats aimed at destroying her fashion career go too far, Ally’s convinced she’s living in crazy town. The sensible thing would be to retreat home before it all ends in spectacular fashion. But will Ally be leaving more than her dreams behind if she says goodbye to Hollywood? This glamorous, fast-paced contemporary romance that will make you smile, is perfect for fans of Rachel Gibson, Victoria Dahl, Susan Elizabeth Phillips, and Liliana Hart.
Despite his tremendous success, Billy Joel’s gifts as a composer and commentator on American life are long overdue for a thorough investigation. In Billy Joel: America’s Piano Man, music historian Joshua S. Duchan looks at the career and music of this remarkable singer-songwriter, exploring the unique ways Joel channels and transforms the cultural life of a changing America over four decades into bestselling song after song and album after album. Billy Joel has not always enjoyed the acclaim of music critics, who have characterized his music as inauthentic and lacking a uniqueness of style. Duchan corrects this misunderstanding by exploring the depth and degree to which Joel’s songs engage with social, cultural, political, and economic issues. Organized by major themes and including original interviews with Joel himself, Duchan’s book delves into Joel’s endeavors as a musician, lyricist, and commentator on questions of geography and regionalism, politics, working- and middle-class culture, human relationships, and the history of music itself. Duchan draws on key songs from Joel’s career to explore each theme, from his folk-like lament for Long Island’s changing industry and lifestyle in “The Downeaster ‘Alexa’” to his emotional ode to Vietnam veterans in “Goodnight Saigon.” Original interviews with Billy Joel blend with Duchan’s engaging analysis to provide readers of all backgrounds and ages a new look at these unforgettable songs. Music lovers and historians of both the academic and armchair variety will find this exploration of Joel’s work a rewarding adventure into America’s social, cultural, political, economic, and—above all—musical history.
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