Overview

Media gurus Darwin Porter and Danforth Prince are the owners and innkeepers of a wise and venerable Grande Dame, Magnolia House. Built in the 1830s and enlarged during America's Civil War, it's a NYC landmark in which at least fifty titles within the world-famous Frommer Travel Guides, and all of the show biz biographies of America's feistiest pop-culture publisher, Blood Moon Productions, were conceived, researched, and written. This is the first in Blood Moon's Magnolia House Series, chatty, ironic, and irreverent memoirs in which the authors (as filtered through the historic monument that sheltered them) review the icons and divas they encountered during their course of their work in travel and show-biz publishing. It's an overview of the seismic ironies associated with celebrity, fame and circumstance. This is an only in America story, a sophisticated, witty overview direct from the high-octane peak of The American Century. Loaded with gossip, some of it extracted from Blood Moon's award-winning backlist of celebrity biographies, it's about the famous or notorious players, some of them tragic, whose talents to amuse helped make America Great.

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9781936003655

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As Reviewed by Diane Donovan, Editor, California Bookwatch and the Midwest Book Review Historic Magnolia House V. 1 Darwin Porter & Danforth Prince Blood Moon Productions 9781936003655 $23.95 www.bloodmoonproductions.com Anyone interested in the history of Staten Island, including expos s and lively surveys of landmarks and personalities alike, must place Historic Magnolia House V. 1 on their reading lists. Intended for destination-bound visitors to the island but equally accessible for armchair readers with a particular interest in the region's history and culture, this blends travel writing with the passion of history and adds tabloid drama for good measure. This means that readers seeking a dry history, a travelogue, or a gossip piece will all be surprised by the multifaceted approach of Historic Magnolia House V. 1, which proves that historical facts can be lively and engrossing, travelogues can hold the background and sense of place that go beyond observational works, and tabloid drama holds its place in any history and culture under close examination. Black and white vintage photos liberally pepper this memoir of film personalities, celebrities, the lives of entertainers and eccentrics, and the many personalities who have moved through Staten Island for over a century. Combine racy scandals and facts with a wider-ranging survey of regional Americana for an engrossing production which should reach well beyond performing arts or biography holdings to engross readers from other disciplines.

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Hailed for their ability to skewer the pretentions and myths of the Entertainment Industry, Darwin Porter and Danforth Prince are the most prolific celebrity biographers in the world. Winners of many literary awards for their work as long-time players at THE FROMMER GUIDES, they've spent a lifetime documenting the foibles and eccentricities of Celebrity and Fame in America.

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