In 1984 America celebrated the one hundredth anniversary of the first successful roller coaster device: La Marcus A. Thompson’s switchback railway, erected at Coney Island. Robert Cartmell examines every phase of roller coaster history, from the use of the roller coaster by Albert Einstein to demonstrate his theory of physics, to John Allen’s use of psychology in designing one.

"An utterly satisfying examination of the business of popular music." —Nathaniel Rich, The Atlantic There’s a reason today’s ubiquitous pop hits are so hard to ignore—they’re designed that way. The Song Machine goes behind the scenes to offer an insider’s look at the global hit factories manufacturing the songs that have everyone hooked. Full of vivid, unexpected characters—alongside industry heavy-hitters like Katy Perry, Rihanna, Max Martin, and Ester Dean—this fascinating journey into the strange world of pop music reveals how a new approach to crafting smash hits is transforming marketing, technology, and even listeners’ brains. You’ll never think about music the same way again. A Wall Street Journal Best Business Book

“A tour de force of reporting” (The Washington Post) from a Pulitzer–prize winning journalist that examines the often-corrupt machine producing America’s basketball stars “Indispensable.”—The Wall Street Journal “Often heart-breaking, always riveting.”—The New York Times Book Review “Tremendous.”—The Plain Dealer Winner of the PEN/ESPN Award for Literary Sportswriting• Winner of the Award for Excellence in the Coverage of Youth Sports Using eight years of unfettered access and a keen sense of a story’s deepest truths, journalist George Dohrmann reveals a cutthroat world where boys as young as eight or nine are subjected to a dizzying torrent of scrutiny and exploitation. At the book’s heart are the personal stories of two compelling figures: Joe Keller, an ambitious coach with a master plan to find and promote “the next LeBron,” and Demetrius Walker, a fatherless latchkey kid who falls under Keller’s sway and struggles to live up to unrealistic expectations. Complete with a new “where-are-they-now” epilogue by the author, Play Their Hearts Out is a thoroughly compelling narrative exposing the gritty reality that lies beneath so many dreams of fame and glory. One of GQ’S 50 Best Books of Literary Journalism of the 21st Century • One of the Best Books of the Year: Los Angeles Times, The Christian Science Monitor, Kirkus Reviews This edition includes an exclusive conversation between George Dohrmann and bestselling author Seth Davis.

Theme parks are a uniquely interactive and enduring form of entertainment that have influenced architecture, technology, and culture in surprising ways for more than a century, as Scott Lukas now reveals in his compelling historical chronicle. Theme Park takes the primitive amusements of pleasure gardens as its starting point and launches from there into a rich, in-depth investigation of the evolution of the theme park over the twentieth century. Lukas examines theme parks in countries around the world—including in the United States, Mexico, Europe, Japan, China, South Africa, and Australia—and how themed fairs and parks developed through diverse means and in a variety of settings. The book examines world-famous and lesser-known parks, including the early parks of Coney Island; Madrid’s Movieworld; a series of World Fairs and their luxurious exhibition halls; Six Flags parks and virtual theme parks today; and, of course, the unparalleled achievements of Disneyland and Disney World. Lukas analyzes the theme park as a living entity that unexpectedly shapes people, their relationships, and the world around them. Theme parks have now become complex representations of the human mind itself, he contends, through its interpretations of books, feature films, video games, and Web sites. Ultimately, Theme Park reveals, the wider influence of theme parks can be found in the shopping malls, branded stores, and casinos that employ the tricks and techniques of amusement parks to dominate our entertainment world today. Packed with captivating illustrations, Theme Park takes us on historical roller coaster ride that both reanimates the places that shaped our childhoods and anticipates the future of escapism and fantasy fun.

Jason Wood is Director of Heritage Consultancy Services, Lancaster, UK, and former Professor of Cultural Heritage at Leeds Metropolitan University, UK.

Discusses the history, physics, parts, and design of roller coasters and examines some modern examples.

Experience the electrifying, never-before-told true story of amusement parks, from the middle ages to present day, and meet the colorful (and sometimes criminal) characters who are responsible for their enchanting charms. Step right up! The Amusement Park is a rich, anecdotal history that begins nine centuries ago with the "pleasure gardens" of Europe and England and ends with the most elaborate modern parks in the world. It's a history told largely through the stories of the colorful, sometimes hedonistic characters who built them, including: Showmen like Joseph and Nicholas Schenck and Marcus Loew Railroad barons Andrew Mellon and Henry E. Huntington The men who ultimately destroyed the parks, including Robert Moses and Fred Trump Gifted artisans and craft-people who brought the parks to life An amazing cast of supporting players, from Al Capone to Annie Oakley And, of course, this is a full-throttle celebration of the rides, those marvels of engineering and heart-stopping thrills from an author, Stephen Silverman, whose life-long passion for his subject shines through. The parks and fairs featured include the 1893 Chicago World's Fair, Coney Island, Steeplechase Park, Dreamland, Euclid Beach Park, Cedar Point, Palisades Park, Ferrari World, Dollywood, Sea World, Six Flags Great Adventure, Universal Studios, Disney World and Disneyland, and many more.

Seven stunning stories of speculative fiction by the author of A Boy and His Dog. In a post-apocalyptic world, four men and one woman are all that remain of the human race, brought to near extinction by an artificial intelligence. Programmed to wage war on behalf of its creators, the AI became self-aware and turned against humanity. The five survivors are prisoners, kept alive and subjected to brutal torture by the hateful and sadistic machine in an endless cycle of violence. This story and six more groundbreaking and inventive tales that probe the depths of mortal experience prove why Grand Master of Science Fiction Harlan Ellison has earned the many accolades to his credit and remains one of the most original voices in American literature. I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream also includes “Big Sam Was My Friend,” “Eyes of Dust,” “World of the Myth,” “Lonelyache,” Hugo Award finalist “Delusion for a Dragon Slayer,” and Hugo and Nebula Award finalist “Pretty Maggie Moneyeyes.”

Together with the Olympics, world's fairs are one of the few regular international events of sufficient scale to showcase a spectrum of sights, wonders, learning opportunities, technological advances, and new (or renewed) urban districts, and to present them all to a mass audience. Meet Me at the Fair: A World's Fair Reader breaks new ground in scholarship on world's fairs by incorporating a number of short new texts that investigate world's fairs in their multiple aspects: political, urban/architectural, anthropological/ sociological, technological, commercial, popular, and representational. Contributors come from eight different countries and represent affiliations in academia, museums and libraries, professional and architectural firms, non-profit organizations, and government regulatory agencies. In taking the measure of both the material artifacts and the larger cultural production of world's fairs, the volume presents its own phantasmagoria of disciplinary perspectives, historical periods, geographical locales, media, and messages, mirroring the microcosmic form of the world's fair itself.

Necrosaurus Rex tells the tale of Martin, a simple janitor, who takes an unfortunate trip through time, becomes a violent mutant, and the father of us all. There's 14 billion years crushed inside these pages, and most of them are pretty nasty. This book is a jet black rumination on the concept of miracles and the creation of the universe, a narrative whose lineage exists somewhere between Moravagine, Maldoror, and David Copperfield. Genesis, the Crucifixion, and Revelations reimagined as a transgressive nightmare. This is Necrosaurus Rex.