The true story of Nathaniel Ayers, a musician who becomes schizophrenic and homeless, and his friendship with Steve Lopez, the Los Angeles columnist who discovers and writes about him in the newspaper.
The most ambitious and personal account ever written about Hollywood's most gracious star-Audrey Hepburn by Barry Paris is a "moving portrayal" (The New York Times Book Review) that truly captures the woman who captured our hearts...With the insights of family and friends who never before spoke to a Hepburn biographer-and never-before-published photographs-Paris has created an in-depth portrait of the actress, from her childhood in Nazi-occupied Europe, through her legendary career, and into her UN ambassadorship.
Kurt Weill--the famed composer of The Threepenny Opera, Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny, Knickerbocker Holiday, One Touch of Venus, Lost in the Stars, and many other musical works--led a life as rich and complex as the music for which he is so justly acclaimed. This engaging and lavishly illustrated book draws on a wealth of previously unexplored written and pictorial material to present a biography of Weill that is the most up to date and balanced ever written. Jurgen Schebera explores the many phases of Weill's life, from his childhood as the son of a cantor in the Jewish section of Dessau, Germany, to his renunciation of Germany in 1933, his emigration to America in 1935, and his premature death there in 1950. Schebera describes Weill's rise to prominence during the Weimar Republic, when he created brilliant orchestral and chamber music and became a leading operatic innovator; his marriage, divorce, and remarriage to the famed actress Lotte Lenya; his escape from Nazi Germany, exile in France, and move to America; his collaboration with such famed writers and lyricists as Georg Kaiser, Bertolt Brecht, Maxwell Anderson, Moss Hart, Ira Gershwin, S.J. Perelman, and Ogden Nash; and his efforts in the United States to aid the mobilization for war. He presents fascinating information about Weill's musical creations: an anti-war musical (Johnny Johnson); a biblical drama (The Eternal Road); his first American song "hit," "September Song"; a Kiddush for cantor, chorus, and organ; a new genre of Broadway opera (Street Scene); a musical tragedy (Lost in the Stars); and many other musical ventures in New York and Hollywood. Schebera contends that it is pointless to argue the relative merits of Weill's music from his European and American periods, as many critics have done. As Weill himself said, "I have never acknowledged the difference between 'serious' music and 'light' music. There is only good music and bad music." And, in fact, the current international renaissance of Kurt Weill's works attests to the beauty, originality, and variety of the music he composed throughout his career. First published in Germany to enthusiastic reviews, this English edition adds new information and illustrations to the earlier work.
The New York Times bestselling author of Doc and Predator delivers a riveting true-crime account of one mother's determination to bring her daughter's murderer to justice, and to rebuild her life after the suicide of her devastated husband.
