Book picks similar to
The Ossie Clark Diaries by Ossie Clark
biographies-of-men
fashion
fashion-and-style
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Honky Tonk Angel: The Intimate Story of Patsy Cline
Ellis Nassour - 1993
But when she sang, she was an angel. Her career...came the hard way, after she battle a Virginia hardscrabble childhood and broke through the all-male barriers of Nashville to make America "Crazy" for country music. Her image...flouted all the taboos. Brassy, big-hearted, sexy as hell, she dressed like a cowgirl or a call girl, swore like a truck driver, and seduced men like a femme fatale. Her money...bought her a dream house and a silver fox coat. But it was too little, too late to erase the memories of mental breakdown and marriages-or avert the tragedies to come. Her men...were lady-killers-hard-loving, big-talking country boys who would hit the bottle, let her down and break her heart. Her music...remains haunting, earthy and selling millions...even though she fought against recording her hits, "Walkin' After Midnight" and "I Fall to Pieces," because they weren't "country enough."
Derek Prince: A Biography
Stephen Mansfield - 2005
Not just another famous preacher's story, this biography promises to stir readers' faith as they discover Prince's unique brand of biblical wisdom and insight as well as his legacy as a father, prophet, teacher, and leader.
Pablo Escobar: A Life From Beginning to End
Hourly History - 2018
An international drug kingpin with a cult following, Pablo Escobar is legendary for his infamy, but he began his life with rather modest roots. Born to a simple farmer, no one ever dreamed Escobar would become the number one drug dealer in the world. He carved out a drug empire in the city of Medellín, Colombia and the surrounding Aburrá Valley and Andes mountain range. Inside you will read about... ✓ The Son of a Farmhand ✓ Pablo’s Political Career ✓ The Hit Job ✓ Palace of Justice Siege ✓ Prison Break and Manhunt ✓ Escobar’s Rooftop Death And much more! As Escobar gained wealth and prestige off of the cocaine trade, he became a kind of populist Robin Hood to the masses. He often used his money for philanthropist purposes such as building parks and soccer stadiums and even helping to pave highways. At first the government was willing to turn a blind eye to his business practices, but once Escobar gained a seat as an official alternate representative in the Colombian Congress everything changed. And by 1993 he was on the run, not just from the Colombian government but also from the CIA, rival drug cartels, paramilitary groups, and the ever-infamous vigilante death squad Los Pepes. Cornered and with nowhere left to run, the man who used to be known to raise the roof would spend his last few moments of life bleeding to death on a rooftop. This is the story of Pablo Escobar.
Mark Rothko: A Biography
James E.B. Breslin - 1993
Drawing on exclusive access to Mark Rothko's personal papers and over one hundred interviews with artists, patrons, and dealers, James Breslin tells the story of a life in art—the personal costs and professional triumphs, the convergence of genius and ego, the clash of culture and commerce. Breslin offers us not only an enticing look at Rothko as a person, but delivers a lush, in-depth portrait of the New York art scene of the 1930s, ’40s, and ’50s—the world of Abstract Expressionism, of Pollock, Rothko, de Kooning, and Klein, which would influence artists for generations to come."In Breslin, Rothko has the ideal biographer—thorough but never tedious, a good storyteller with an ear for the spoken word, fond but not fawning, and possessed of a most rare ability to comment on non-representational art without sounding preposterous."—Robert Kiely, Boston Book Review"Breslin impressively recreates Mark Rothko's troubled nature, his tormented life, and his disturbing canvases. . . . The artist's paintings become almost tangible within Breslin's pages, and Rothko himself emerges as an alarming physical force."—Robert Warde, Hungry Mind Review"This remains beyond question the finest biography so far devoted to an artist of the New York School."-Arthur C. Danto, Boston Sunday Globe"Clearly written, full of intelligent insights, and thorough."—Hayden Herrera, Art in America"Breslin spent seven years working on this book, and he has definitely done his homework."-Nancy M. Barnes, Boston Phoenix"He's made the tragedy of his subject's life the more poignant."—Eric Gibson, The New Criterion"Mr. Breslin's book is, in my opinion, the best life of an American painter that has yet been written . . . a biographical classic. It is painstakingly researched, fluently written and unfailingly intelligent in tracing the tragic course of its subject's tormented character."—Hilton Kramer, New York Times Book Review, front page reviewJames E. B. Breslin (1936-1996) was professor of English at the University of California, Berkeley, and author of From Modern to Contemporary: American Poetry, 1945-1965 and William Carlos Williams: An American Artist.
More Room in a Broken Heart: The True Adventures of Carly Simon
Stephen Davis - 2012
Her music has touched countless lives since her debut in the 1970s, yet her own life story has remained unpublished-until now. Tapping private archives, family interviews, and a forty-year friendship with the legend herself, Stephen Davis at last captures Carly Simon's extraordinary journey from shy teenager to superstar. I Believe in Love candidly covers everything her fans want to know, including Growing up with her father, publishing mogul Richard Simon The Bob Dylan turning point that launched her career The real story behind "You're So Vain" Carly's severe stage fright (she's the only musical guest to pretape an SNL segment) Romantic involvements with Mick Jagger, Warren Beatty, and Cat Stevens How Carly and James Taylor went from being pop music's reigning couple to independent souls living at opposite ends of Massachusetts Surviving breast cancer Her recent financial and spiritual crises Along the way, Davis vividly takes readers back to some of the most powerful eras in American music history and delivers a tribute worthy of the artist and her loyal fans, who know that nobody does it better than Carly Simon.
A Walk on Part :Diaries 1994 - 1999
Chris Mullin - 2011
Together with the bestselling A View from the Foothills and Decline & Fall, the complete trilogy covers the rise and fall of New Labour from start to finish.Witty, elegant and wickedly indiscreet, the Mullin diaries are widely reckoned to be the best account of the New Labour era."Every once in a while," wrote David Cameron, " political diaries emerge that are so irreverent and insightful that they are destined to be handed out as leaving presents across Whitehall for years to come."
Skin Deep: Women on Skin Care, Makeup, and Looking Their Best
Bee Shapiro - 2017
Beauty—unlike fashion—is something almost anyone can participate in and still have stellar results: the moisturizer that Emma Roberts buys at Whole Foods is just as accessible to any other 26-year-old.Skin Deep is an in-depth look at the surprising role that beauty plays in our lives, the large or small amount of work it involves on a daily basis, the money spent, the time taken, and what it means to everyone from ballet dancers to musicians, models to powerful entrepreneurs. You’ll learn how Kylie Jenner gets Instagram-ready; the preferred face mask of supermodel Natalia Vodianova; what beauty staples Olympian Allyson Felix uses off the track; and exactly what makes Martha Stewart’s skin-care regimen cost $2,000. Including 10 new subjects, alongside favorites like Gwyneth Paltrow, Priyanka Chopra, and Anna Kendrick, plus sidebars and photography, Skin Deep takes an intriguing look at contemporary beauty, not only through entertaining celebrity interviews, but with in-depth guidance from names like Christophe Robin and Patrick Ta, as well as other beauty experts, and through Shapiro’s own look at popular trends—for both a sense of context and a wealth of applicable beauty advice.
I Killed Pink Floyd's Pig: Inside Stories of Sex, Drugs and Rock & Roll
Beau Phillips - 2014
Never-been-told stories of sex, drugs and rock & roll. Plus exclusive photos! It's your all-access pass...a behind-the-scenes VIP tour of when rock was great. The author takes you backstage and inside bands' dressing rooms, hotel suites and private planes of Led Zeppelin, Rolling Stones, AC/DC, Eric Clapton, Paul McCartney and dozens more.
Betty Broderick: Telling on myself
Betty Broderick - 2015
Worse still, he is a notoriously hard-ball lawyer with every intention of crushing you in any way he can, of erasing you from his life, of reducing you to nothing, so that he can move on as if you never existed. Daniel T. Broderick III’s relentless harassment of his discarded wife, Betty, made her increasingly crazy as he and his girlfriend – then second wife – Linda Kolkena Broderick piled on the pressure, until one day, on November 5, 1989, at her wits’ end and believing herself to be acting in self-defense, she confronted them in the early hours of the morning and in a panic shot them both dead. A multitude of onlookers has absolved Betty for what she did. Many even admire her, especially if they have suffered similar fates to hers. One juror at her trial openly questioned why she had taken so long to kill Dan under such extreme provocation. Now, twenty-five years into a thirty-two year to life prison sentence for her second-degree murder of Dan and Linda Broderick, Betty has reluctantly decided to give her personal account of what led up to that fatal and fateful day, when all three of their futures came violently and abruptly to an end.
It's a Long Story: My Life
Willie Nelson - 2015
Funny. Leaving no stone unturned." . . . So say the publishers about this book I've written. What I say is that this is the story of my life, told as clear as a Texas sky and in the same rhythm that I lived it. It's a story of restlessness and the purity of the moment and living right. Of my childhood in Abbott, Texas, to the Pacific Northwest, from Nashville to Hawaii and all the way back again. Of selling vacuum cleaners and encyclopedias while hosting radio shows and writing song after song, hoping to strike gold. It's a story of true love, wild times, best friends, and barrooms, with a musical sound track ripping right through it. My life gets lived on the road, at home, and on the road again, tried and true, and I've written it all down from my heart to yours. Signed,Willie Nelson
The Roof: The Beatles' Final Concert
Ken Mansfield - 2018
January 30, 1969 was one of those moments. There are those who were on the periphery of the event that day and heard what was going on; but as one of the few remaining insiders who accompanied the Beatles up onto the cold windswept roof of the Apple building, Ken Mansfield had a front row seat to the full sensory experience of the moment and witnessed what turned out to be beginning of the end. Ken shares in The Roof: The Beatles Final Concert, the sense that something special was taking place before his eyes that would live on forever in the hearts and souls of millions. As the US manager of Apple, Ken Mansfield was on the scene in the days, weeks, and months leading up to this monumental event. He shares his insights into the factors that brought them up onto that roof and why one of the greatest bands of all time left it all on that stage. Join Ken as he reflects on the relationships he built with the Fab Four and the Apple corps and what each player meant to this symphony of music history.
Sinatra's Century: One Hundred Notes on the Man and His World
David Lehman - 2015
David Lehman uses each of these short pieces to look back on a single facet of the entertainer’s story—from his childhood in Hoboken, to his emergence as “The Voice” in the 1940s, to the wild professional (and romantic) fluctuations that followed. Lehman offers new insights and revisits familiar stories—Sinatra’s dramatic love affairs with some of the most beautiful stars in Hollywood, including Lauren Bacall, Marilyn Monroe, and Ava Gardner; his fall from grace in the late 1940s and resurrection during the “Capitol Years” of the 1950s; his bonds with the rest of the Rat Pack; and his long tenure as the Chairman of the Board, viewed as the eminence grise of popular music inspiring generations of artists, from Bobby Darin to Bono to Bob Dylan.Brimming with Lehman’s own lifelong affection for Sinatra, the book includes lists of unforgettable performances; engaging insight on what made Sinatra the model of American machismo—and the epitome of romance; and clear-eyed assessments of the foibles that impacted his life and work. Warm and enlightening, Sinatra’s Century is full-throated appreciation of Sinatra for every fan.
Out of the Box: The Highs and Lows of a Champion Smuggler
Julie McSorley - 2014
He returned to Australia in a box, but that was only the start of his adventures.Crazily impulsive, romantic, and free-spirited, Reg became a national hero for smuggling himself 13,000 miles home as air freight. But as his fame and sporting career faded, Reg decided to smuggle something very different. Soon, he was on the run with his girlfriend, playing a cat-and-mouse game with police on three continents. A wild road trip across India and Africa—idyllic beaches and prison hellholes, shady friends and shadier cops, gun-toting militias and drug-running gangsters —led to a court room in Sri Lanka and the fight of his life. Could Reg beat the death sentence he’d just been given, or was this box too big to climb out of?
To Live's to Fly: The Ballad of the Late, Great Townes Van Zandt
John Kruth - 2005
Worth, Texas, hounded by alcoholism and an unshakable depression, Van Zandt pursued a nomadic existence following his muse, whatever the cost to himself, friends, and family. Based on exclusive interviews with everyone who knew Van Zandt, including his best friend Guy Clark and colleagues like Steve Earle and John Prine, To Live’s To Fly is a compelling portrait of a complex, haunted artist.
Far Outside the Ordinary
Prissy Elrod - 2014
But it happened.An emotionally honest account, Far Outside the Ordinary chronicles the period in Prissy’s life when, during a routine physical, her fifty-yearold husband is given less than a year to live. Southern black caregivers move into her home and work around the clock to aid her family. Soon, Prissy finds herself a spectator in her own home, observing events far outside the boundaries of her once ordinary life.Far Outside the Ordinary is also a story of happily ever after, a romantic fairy tale. When her high school boyfriend reappears in her life, Prissy learns love has no expiration date. Sometimes a second chance at love can come disguised, and when least expected.