A riveting story of ambition, greed, and genius unfolding at the dawn of modern America. This landmark biography brings into focus a fascinating brilliant entrepreneur—like Steve Jobs or Walt Disney, a true American visionary—who risked everything to realize his bold dream of a Hollywood empire. Although a major Hollywood studio still bears William Fox’s name, the man himself has mostly been forgotten by history, even written off as a failure. Now, in this fascinating biography, Vanda Krefft corrects the record, explaining why Fox’s legacy is central to the history of Hollywood. At the heart of William Fox’s life was the myth of the American Dream. His story intertwines the fate of the nineteenth-century immigrants who flooded into New York, the city’s vibrant and ruthless gilded age history, and the birth of America’s movie industry amid the dawn of the modern era. Drawing on a decade of original research, The Man Who Made the Movies offers a rich, compelling look at a complex man emblematic of his time, one of the most fascinating and formative eras in American history. Growing up in Lower East Side tenements, the eldest son of impoverished Hungarian immigrants, Fox began selling candy on the street. That entrepreneurial ambition eventually grew one small Brooklyn theater into a $300 million empire of deluxe studios and theaters that rivaled those of Adolph Zukor, Marcus Loew, and the Warner brothers, and launched stars such as Theda Bara. Amid the euphoric roaring twenties, the early movie moguls waged a fierce battle for control of their industry. A fearless risk-taker, Fox won and was hailed as a genius—until a confluence of circumstances, culminating with the 1929 stock market crash, led to his ruin.

The story of W.K.L. Dickson—assistant to Edison, inventor, and key figure in early cinematography: “Valuable and comprehensive.” —Communication Booknotes Quarterly W.K.L. Dickson was Thomas Edison’s assistant in charge of the experimentation that led to the Kinetoscope and Kinetograph—the first commercially successful moving image machines. In 1891–1892, he established what we know today as the 35mm format. Dickson also designed the Black Maria film studio and facilities to develop and print film, and supervised production of more than one hundred films for Edison. After leaving Edison, he became a founding member of the American Mutoscope Company, which later became the American Mutoscope & Biograph, then Biograph. In 1897, he went to England to set up the European branch of the company. Over the course of his career, Dickson made between five hundred and seven hundred films, which are studied today by scholars of the early cinema. This well-illustrated book offers a window onto early film history from the perspective of Dickson’s own oeuvre.

One of the New York Times Best True Crime of 2022 A “spellbinding, thriller-like” (Shelf Awareness) history about the invention of the motion picture and the mysterious, forgotten man behind it—detailing his life, work, disappearance, and legacy. The year is 1888, and Louis Le Prince is finally testing his “taker” or “receiver” device for his family on the front lawn. The device is meant to capture ten to twelve images per second on film, creating a reproduction of reality that can be replayed as many times as desired. In an otherwise separate and detached world, occurrences from one end of the globe could now be viewable with only a few days delay on the other side of the world. No human experience—from the most mundane to the most momentous—would need to be lost to history. In 1890, Le Prince was granted patents in four countries ahead of other inventors who were rushing to accomplish the same task. But just weeks before unveiling his invention to the world, he mysteriously disappeared and was never seen or heard from again. Three and half years later, Thomas Edison, Le Prince’s rival, made the device public, claiming to have invented it himself. And the man who had dedicated his life to preserving memories was himself lost to history—until now. The Man Who Invented Motion Pictures pulls back the curtain and presents a “passionate, detailed defense of Louis Le Prince…unfurled with all the cliffhangers and red herrings of a scripted melodrama” (The New York Times Book Review). This “fascinating, informative, skillfully articulated narrative” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review) presents the never-before-told history of the motion picture and sheds light on the unsolved mystery of Le Prince’s disappearance.

A "now it can be told" story of secret Operation Mincemeat. This was a carefully prepared ruse involving planted documents on a floating body which successfully misled the German commanders as to the Sicily invasion. Told by the British naval officer who originated the plot.

"Sometimes the things that may or may not be true are the things a man needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money, money and power, mean nothing; that good always triumphs over evil, and I want you to remember this...true love never dies. You remember that, boy...Doesn't matter if it's true or not. You see, a man should believe in those things, because those are the things worth believing in." --Hub McCann, Secondhand Lions In the film Secondhand Lions, Hub McCann, a soldier and adventurer grown old in years but not in spirit, frequently teaches teenage males the meaning of manhood. He lives by a code of honor and courage, and tries to pass on that code to young men in trouble. Father, grandfather, and teacher, Jeff Minick has also witnessed first-hand the struggles of young men striving to belong to a world that often seems bent on abolishing manhood altogether. Young men between the ages of sixteen and thirty can make babies, go to war, and even earn large incomes, but some of them remain arrested adolescents. They lack a code to live by. Frequently they lack a model for manhood. Movies Make The Man: The Hollywood Guide to Life, Love, and Faith seeks to provide such models. Using as evidence dozens of popular movies, Minick examines the meaning of courage, wisdom, love, honor, and faith in relationship to manhood. Using films as varied as Gladiator, Bridget Jones's Diary, Master and Commander, and Kate and Leopold, Minick shares with readers the lessons for men found in these great films, lessons ranging from how to treat a woman on a first date to the place of faith in a man's life. To perform meaningful work, to believe in something worthy of our belief, to find someone to love: these building blocks for a life lived with purpose can all be found on the big screen. Movies Make The Man should appeal not only to young men, but also to parents, teachers, coaches, and other mentors. From reviews of Jeff Minick's other books: Amanda Bell: "Jeff Minick's novel is a mix of humor and tragedy, warmth and somberness that will echo deep in reader's souls." --Eugene Girin, Chronicles Magazine Learning As I Go: "Delivered with wit and style, Jeff Minick's comments on politics and religion fit my own sentiments exactly." --Joe Ecclesia, Smoky Mountain News Dust On Their Wings: "One need not be a believer to appreciate Dust On Their Wings, though someone who accepts the reality of angels and of 'the Love that moves the sun and the other stars' will find in these pages particular satisfaction in a tale well told." Karl Keating, Online Review

"This book provides essential documentation of all known Edison films made between 1890 and 1900. Thomas Edison and his associates at the Edison Laboratory in West Orange, New Jersey, invented the first system of commercial motion pictures." "Making the historical framework predominant while retaining traditional cataloging features, Edison Motion Pictures, 18901900 is of value to a wide range of scholars interested in American life at the turn of the century - those working in performance studies, film and media studies, cultural history, ethnic studies, and social and political history. Documentary filmmakers, film programmers, archivists, and librarians can also benefit from using this catalog." "Edison films from the end of the nineteenth century offer a unique visual record of American entertainment and popular culture - moving images that become much more interesting and useful when they can be examined in conjunction with pertinent documentation." "Scholars concerned with portrayals of war, depictions of the American presidency, and many other topics in the nation's political history will find much useful information."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

From the bestselling author of The Queen's Gambit, the landmark science fiction novel that inspired the classic 1976 film starring David Bowie and is the basis for the Showtime series A man wanders into town one day seemingly out of nowhere. He starts by peddling valuables just to get by. But he possesses uncanny scientific knowledge, which he uses to develop technologies of a marvelous nature. In time he builds a corporate empire that propels him to unimaginable wealth—but to what end? His rapid ascent to the highest levels of success is remarkable, but the vision of his enterprise begins to falter as he succumbs to afflictions that feel all-too-human, and the true purpose of his presence here on earth is in grave danger of being abandoned.

From the bestselling author of The Passenger and the Pulitzer Prize–winning novel The Road comes a "profoundly disturbing and gorgeously rendered" novel (The Washington Post) that returns to the Texas-Mexico border, setting of the famed Border Trilogy. The time is our own, when rustlers have given way to drug-runners and small towns have become free-fire zones. One day, a good old boy named Llewellyn Moss finds a pickup truck surrounded by a bodyguard of dead men. A load of heroin and two million dollars in cash are still in the back. When Moss takes the money, he sets off a chain reaction of catastrophic violence that not even the law—in the person of aging, disillusioned Sheriff Bell—can contain. As Moss tries to evade his pursuers—in particular a mysterious mastermind who flips coins for human lives—McCarthy simultaneously strips down the American crime novel and broadens its concerns to encompass themes as ancient as the Bible and as bloodily contemporary as this morning’s headlines. No Country for Old Men is a triumph. Look for Cormac McCarthy's latest bestselling novels, The Passenger and Stella Maris.

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • LOOK FOR THE NETFLIX ORIGINAL DOCUMENTARY SERIES • “Both an American tragedy and [Grisham’s] strongest legal thriller yet, all the more gripping because it happens to be true.”—Entertainment Weekly John Grisham’s first work of nonfiction: a true crime masterpiece that tells the story of small town justice gone terribly awry. In the Major League draft of 1971, the first player chosen from the state of Oklahoma was Ron Williamson. When he signed with the Oakland A’s, he said goodbye to his hometown of Ada and left to pursue his dreams of big league glory. Six years later he was back, his dreams broken by a bad arm and bad habits. He began to show signs of mental illness. Unable to keep a job, he moved in with his mother and slept twenty hours a day on her sofa. In 1982, a twenty-one-year-old cocktail waitress in Ada named Debra Sue Carter was raped and murdered, and for five years the police could not solve the crime. For reasons that were never clear, they suspected Ron Williamson and his friend Dennis Fritz. The two were finally arrested in 1987 and charged with capital murder. With no physical evidence, the prosecution’s case was built on junk science and the testimony of jailhouse snitches and convicts. Dennis Fritz was found guilty and given a life sentence. Ron Williamson was sent to death row. If you believe that in America you are innocent until proven guilty, this book will shock you. If you believe in the death penalty, this book will disturb you. If you believe the criminal justice system is fair, this book will infuriate you. Don’t miss Framed, John Grisham’s first work of nonfiction since The Innocent Man, co-authored with Centurion Ministries founder Jim McCloskey.

A biography of the Indian mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan. The book gives a detailed account of his upbringing in India, his mathematical achievements, and his mathematical collaboration with English mathematician G. H. Hardy. The book also reviews the life of Hardy and the academic culture of Cambridge University during the early twentieth century.