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The Ultimate Hollywood Tour Book (2nd Edition)
Used an earlier edition of this book when I took a self-guided tour in 1997, and bought this newer edition for my trip to L.A. in 2007. Indispensible! Better than a "map of the stars' homes" any day. Thoroughly recommended if you are planning to drive yourself around the various parts of L.A. looking for your particular favorite haunts. Thanks to this book, in 1997 I got to see (and exchange waves with) Jack Lemmon as he drove out of his driveway (no, I wasn't lying in wait. I'd pulled over to double check my location).Though I had far less time to use it on my 2007 trip, I would have felt naked and unprepared just travelling without it. Another great feature about this book is that the author encourages submissions/corrections/additions to add to future editions, so if you discover the rare incorrect or out-of-date piece of info, he wants you to submit it to him so the next edition will be just that much more accurate.Used the info in the book to track down the Playboy Mansion in 1997. Had a neat experience at the mansion gates that trip and have pics to prove it. When I drove by it again in 2007 a few hours before I was to attend a party there that evening, I glanced at the book over in the passenger seat of my rental car and gave it a knowing smile.My copy is autographed. Don't know if that increases its value, but it is a nice touch.
The Ultimate Hollywood Tour Book (2nd Edition)
The Ultimate Hollywood Tour Book is full of interesting facts, historical tidbits and interviews with Hollywood natives that provide readers with a realistic view of Hollywood, past and present. As any worthwhile tour guide should, this book lists hundreds of locations of interest to visit in and around the Hollywood area, extending it's reach to surrounding Los Angeles communities that have ties to the entertainment business. However, the tone of Gordon's book is informative, straightforward and friendly, not off-putting or intentionally misleading, as some guide books can be.Not surprisingly, Gordon's book is even a fun read for those of us born and raised in Hollywood. For me it brought back memories of old haunts, and it evoked nods of approval among friends as we read through many accurate descriptions of favorite locales and pages of sound advice about what to visit and why, as well as what to avoid.Whether you're a native of the Los Angeles area, a tourist planning just a few days' visit to Hollywood, or a local history buff searching for a fun and interesting book to read, you can't go wrong picking up a copy of William Gordon's Ultimate Hollywood Tour Book.
The Ultimate Hollywood Tour Book (2nd Edition)
About 5 years ago I took a summer job giving tours of Hollywood on an old trolley car. One of my most memorable experiences was the day one of the guides for the Beverly Hills tour got sick and I was thrown into the front seat of a tour van and sent on my way to give a tour of the star's homes. It was without a doubt one of the more embarrassing moments of my life as it wasn't my regular gig and I had to make a lot of stuff up because I had no idea whose house was whose and the guy driving the van was as clueless as I was. But if the owner's of the tour company had seen fit to give me this book beforehand I would have known where I was and all those tourists wouldn't have asked for their money back when the tour was over.
The Ultimate Hollywood Tour Book (2nd Edition)
Unlike the other people who reviewed this volume, I do not ever expect to make it all the way out to Los Angelos to actually see some of these many fine attractions. What this volume shows me is that there at least 370 very interesting local attractions in that area, that I counted, and this serves as a very exciting, point by point, historical description of people and events in that area for the past 100 years. What I am interested in is, perhaps a little different than, maybe the majority, would be interested in. The most interesting landmark I saw here does not even exist any more, and that is the house on Ciello Drive in Beverly Hills where the Manson Family Murders took place. I was suprised by the number of landmarks that were not really all that far from there. These include the house that silent film actor Harold Lloyd was still living in at the time, Falcon Lair, which used to be R. Valentinos hideaway house, the Superman Death house, where George Reeves committed suicide in 1959, the last home of Danny Kaye, as well as the former homes of Madonna, Peter Falk, Jack Benny, and the last home of Lucille Ball. This last mentioned home Lucy bought for 85k in 1958, and, 3 years after her death, in 1989, this home sold for 3.7 million dollars !!!another house of interest to me is the Beverly Hillbillys Mansion, and points of interest close to it include former homes of the following celebritys: The Mamas and the Papas, Johnny Carson, Sonny and Cher, Ronald Reagan, Elizabeth Taylor, and Nicholas Cage. There are a number of other locations where famous deaths, murders and suicides have happened, but one of the most famous is where mobster Bugsy Siegel was assinated in 1947, in Bel Air. Houses close to this include the "Owlwood Estate where Joseph Schenk, Marilyn Monroe, Sonny and Cher, and Tony Curtis all lived in at one time, as well as the former homes of Howard Hughes, and Judy Garland, Buddy Hackett, Lana Turner, and Clara Bow.There are sooo many other positive suprises in this book, and it is a chronicle of local history like none other I have ever seen, and, I think, every city in the USA deserves such an extensive historical anecdote book, with a community by community, street by street map description.
The Carpet: Origins, Art and History
This book is a good overview of carpets produced in eight areas- Anatolia, Persia, The Caucasus, Western Turkestan, Eastern Turkestan, India, China, and Europe. The listing of these titles of the various carpet areas should tell you that this book has focused on historical carpets. It is neither the most basic nor the most detailed of books on this subject. There is more emphasis on earlier, more historical carpets, and on more commercially produced rather than tribal carpets. The photographs are wonderful. Overall, I would give this book high marks. Target market for this book would be interior designers or highly informed buyers, not so much the rug dealers or other professionals who want even more detailed information.
Airport
I found this book by chance and wasn't sure whether it would be worth reading. I decided to give it a try... Soon, I was caught up in the book. I just couldn't put it down, I was so eager to find out what would happen next. The book takes you behind the scenes in an airport in the 1970's and shows you all the things you normally don't get to see or even hear about. You get to a point where you care about the characters, and it's important to find out what happens to them... All in all, I really recommend this book, it's definitely worth reading.