Download or read book Carl Weber s Kingpins the Dirty South written by Treasure Hernandez and published by Kingpins. This book was released on 2015 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This installment in Carl Weber's series, in which the hottest urban fiction authors tell dramatic tales of life in cities across the U.S., focuses on dirty deeds in the American South.

Download or read book Carl Weber s Kingpins Chicago written by Silk Smooth and published by National Geographic Books. This book was released on 2017-08-29 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There can only be one: one man with two loyal friends and secrets from the past that will ultimately shake up the entire hood in Chicago; one man on a mission to destroy anyone who doesn't abide by his rules; one man with enough swagger in his walk, confidence in his talk, and the skills and mind-set to build an empire. There's one man bold enough to deliver multiple orgasms yet never tell a soul his real name. He has overpowering strength, a top-notch reputation, power like no other, and a bite that will hurt more than a dog's. Who is he? The streets of Chicago know him as the One and Only...

Download or read book The New Urban Frontier written by Neil Smith and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2005-10-26 with total page 348 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why have so many central and inner cities in Europe, North America and Australia been so radically revamped in the last three decades, converting urban decay into new chic? Will the process continue in the twenty-first century or has it ended? What does this mean for the people who live there? Can they do anything about it? This book challenges conventional wisdom, which holds gentrification to be the simple outcome of new middle-class tastes and a demand for urban living. It reveals gentrification as part of a much larger shift in the political economy and culture of the late twentieth century. Documenting in gritty detail the conflicts that gentrification brings to the new urban 'frontiers', the author explores the interconnections of urban policy, patterns of investment, eviction, and homelessness. The failure of liberal urban policy and the end of the 1980s financial boom have made the end-of-the-century city a darker and more dangerous place. Public policy and the private market are conspiring against minorities, working people, the poor, and the homeless as never before. In the emerging revanchist city, gentrification has become part of this policy of revenge.

Download or read book 740 Park written by Michael Gross and published by Crown. This book was released on 2006-10-10 with total page 580 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the author of House of Outrageous Fortune For seventy-five years, it’s been Manhattan’s richest apartment building, and one of the most lusted-after addresses in the world. One apartment had 37 rooms, 14 bathrooms, 43 closets, 11 working fireplaces, a private elevator, and his-and-hers saunas; another at one time had a live-in service staff of 16. To this day, it is steeped in the purest luxury, the kind most of us could only imagine, until now. The last great building to go up along New York’s Gold Coast, construction on 740 Park finished in 1930. Since then, 740 has been home to an ever-evolving cadre of our wealthiest and most powerful families, some of America’s (and the world’s) oldest money—the kind attached to names like Vanderbilt, Rockefeller, Bouvier, Chrysler, Niarchos, Houghton, and Harkness—and some whose names evoke the excesses of today’s monied elite: Kravis, Koch, Bronfman, Perelman, Steinberg, and Schwarzman. All along, the building has housed titans of industry, political power brokers, international royalty, fabulous scam-artists, and even the lowest scoundrels. The book begins with the tumultuous story of the building’s construction. Conceived in the bubbling financial, artistic, and social cauldron of 1920’s Manhattan, 740 Park rose to its dizzying heights as the stock market plunged in 1929—the building was in dire financial straits before the first apartments were sold. The builders include the architectural genius Rosario Candela, the scheming businessman James T. Lee (Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis’s grandfather), and a raft of financiers, many of whom were little more than white-collar crooks and grand-scale hustlers. Once finished, 740 became a magnet for the richest, oldest families in the country: the Brewsters, descendents of the leader of the Plymouth Colony; the socially-registered Bordens, Hoppins, Scovilles, Thornes, and Schermerhorns; and top executives of the Chase Bank, American Express, and U.S. Rubber. Outside the walls of 740 Park, these were the people shaping America culturally and economically. Within those walls, they were indulging in all of the Seven Deadly Sins. As the social climate evolved throughout the last century, so did 740 Park: after World War II, the building’s rulers eased their more restrictive policies and began allowing Jews (though not to this day African Americans) to reside within their hallowed walls. Nowadays, it is full to bursting with new money, people whose fortunes, though freshly-made, are large enough to buy their way in. At its core this book is a social history of the American rich, and how the locus of power and influence has shifted haltingly from old bloodlines to new money. But it’s also much more than that: filled with meaty, startling, often tragic stories of the people who lived behind 740’s walls, the book gives us an unprecedented access to worlds of wealth, privilege, and extraordinary folly that are usually hidden behind a scrim of money and influence. This is, truly, how the other half—or at least the other one hundredth of one percent—lives.

Download or read book Unreal Estate written by Michael Gross and published by Broadway. This book was released on 2011 with total page 562 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A history of lucrative real estate in Los Angeles shares the lesser-known contributions of a range of figures from Douglas Fairbanks and Marilyn Monroe to Howard Hughes and Ronald Reagan. By the best-selling author of Rogues' Gallery.

Download or read book House of Outrageous Fortune written by Michael Gross and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2014-03-11 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Michael Gross’s new book…packs [in] almost as many stories as there are apartments in the building. The Jackie Collins of real estate likes to map expressions of power, money and ego… Even more crammed with billionaires and their exploits than 740 Park” (Penelope Green, The New York Times). With two concierge-staffed lobbies, a walnut-lined library, a lavish screening room, a private sixty-seat restaurant offering residents room service, a health club complete with a seventy-foot swimming pool, penthouses that cost almost $100 million, and a tenant roster that’s a roll call of business page heroes and villains, Fifteen Central Park West is the most outrageously successful, insanely expensive, titanically tycoon-stuffed real estate development of the twenty-first century. In this “stunning” (CNN) and “deliciously detailed” (Booklist, starred review) New York Times bestseller, journalist Michael Gross turns his gimlet eye on the new-money wonderland that’s sprung up on the southwest rim of Central Park. Mixing an absorbing business epic with hilarious social comedy, Gross “takes another gossip-laden bite out of the upper crust” (Sam Roberts, The New York Times), which includes Denzel Washington, Sting, Norman Lear, top executives, and Russian and Chinese oligarchs, to name a few. And he recounts the legendary building’s inspired genesis, costly construction, and the flashy international lifestyle it has brought to a once benighted and socially déclassé Manhattan neighborhood. More than just an apartment building, 15CPW represents a massive paradigm shift in the lifestyle of New York’s rich and famous—and is a bellwether of the city’s changing social and financial landscape.

Download or read book Prada Plan Protege written by C.N. Phillips and published by . This book was released on 2014-10-31 with total page 233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sometimes leaving the past in the past is exactly what comes back to haunt you. By fleeing New York's clutches Trina thought that she would be able to start fresh. Currently sitting as the Queen of Houston Texas by playing wifey to its king, Omari, she is led to believe she has it all. From the big house, lavish clothes, and being with the love of her life she is happy and living her dream. But when her big brother brings war to Houston's front door that dream soon turns into a nightmare that she can't wake up from. Knowing that someone is coming for his head it is proven that Trina's Prince Charming has a side so dark that not even she is safe from his aim. Gunning at Omari's crown, Chase is determined to knock him off his throne and sit as the new king of the city, but Omari has other tricks up his sleeve. Meanwhile Trina is caught in the bloody crossfire and knows she has to make a decision. Love or family? Join C.N. Phillips as she takes over the reigns for Ashley Antoinette and continues The Prada Plan series.

Download or read book The Reluctant King written by L. Sprague de Camp and published by Baen Books. This book was released on 2016-11-01 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The King had a good head on his shoulders—for the moment, anyway. Everyone agreed that King Jorian of Xylar had been a good and just ruler. In fact, many also agreed that, in this case, it was a pity that the laws of Xylar decreed that each randomly chosen King must reign for only five years and then, after due pomp and ceremony, have his head cut off! Understandably, Jorian himself was wholeheartedly in agreement with the second sentiment, so with the help of a spell provided by the wizard Karadur, he escaped from the beheading ceremony with his head still on his shoulders. Unfortunately, his beloved wife, Queen Estrildis, was left behind, and getting her out of Xylar would be anything but simple—particularly with the Royal Guard of Xylar hot on the trail of their fugitive monarch. With Karadur's magic, Jorian might be able to pull off the rescue. But first, he would have to locate a trove of ancient spells, deal with an enemy wizard, steal an item from a 500-year-old (but still beautiful) princess who turns into a giant serpent at inopportune moments, repair the giant tower clocks of Iraz to fulfill a prophecy, break a pirate siege, and finally fly back to Xylar in an enchanted bathtub and whisk away his beloved Estrildis before the Royal Guard notices that their King (not to mention his head) has returned. Then things began to get complicated... At the publisher's request, this title is sold without DRM (Digital Rights Management).

Download or read book Genuine Authentic written by Michael Gross and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2018-07-24 with total page 427 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A fascinating and comprehensive look into the life of American fashion designer Ralph Lauren, now with an afterword. “Deep-dish...sharp-clawed...honestly admiring.”—New York Times There are at least two Ralph Laurens. To the public he's a gentle, modest, yet secure and purposeful man. Inside the walls of Polo Ralph Lauren, though, he was long seen by some as a narcissist, an insecure ditherer, and, at times, a rampaging tyrant. Michael Gross, author of the bestsellers Model and 740 Park, lays bare the truths of this fashion emperor's rise, and reveals not only the secrets of his meteoric success in marketing our shared fantasies, but also a widely unknown side that's behind the designer’s chic façade.

Download or read book Carl Weber s Kingpins Houston written by Treasure Hernandez and published by Urban Books. This book was released on 2018-12-18 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Life is perfect for Donna and Kim Boon when they move in with their Aunt, until her murder unearths a secret that will alter everything they've ever known. Donna and Kim Boon moved to Houston, Texas with their aunt Lisa when they were orphaned at ten years old. Lisa raised the girls as her own, showering them with everything a young woman could want. The girls have grown up into beautiful and privileged Houstonites and are two of the most eligible bachelorettes in the city, with more suitors than they know how to handle. Life seems perfect, but when Aunt Lisa is gunned down in cold blood, the girls discover a family secret that will change their lives forever.

Download or read book The Fire Next Door written by Ted Galen Carpenter and published by Cato Institute. This book was released on 2012-10-09 with total page 55 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since the Mexican government initiated a military offensive against its country’s powerful drug cartels in December 2006, some 50,000 people have perished and the drugs continue to flow. In The Fire Next Door, Ted Galen Carpenter boldly conveys the growing horror overtaking Mexico and makes the case that the only effective strategy for the United States is to abandon its failed drug prohibition policy, thus depriving drug cartels of financial resources.

Download or read book Carl Weber s Kingpins ATL written by Brick and published by National Geographic Books. This book was released on 2017-03-28 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The saying goes you shouldn't bite the hand that feeds you, but maybe you should if that same hand prevents you from feeding yourself. Every territory has a king, and Metro Atlanta is no exception. Gang lords Blanket and Guerilla have been growing their numbers, never beefing until Guerilla decides to expand, thanks to the help of his enemy’s own rook. Caught in the middle of this battle from different sides of the track are London and Saint. Spoiled rich Roanoke girl London Royal is no exception to the old saying that every girl loves a bad boy and his ways. When she visits the downtrodden Jonesboro neighborhood of Goodman with her best friends, her privileged world changes drastically with one party and later, a tow-truck pickup by bad boy Santana Black. Santana "Saint" Black is anything but a saint. Caught up in the drug game, Saint is a runner and enforcer for Blanket—not to mention he’s from the wrong side of the tracks to have his sights set on London. Can they find love in the middle of a kingpin war, or will both fall to the game of the streets?

Download or read book Pre Incident Indicators of Terrorist Incidents written by Brent L. Smith and published by DIANE Publishing. This book was released on 2011 with total page 540 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a print on demand edition of a hard to find publication. Explores whether sufficient data exists to examine the temporal and spatial relationships that existed in terrorist group planning, and if so, could patterns of preparatory conduct be identified? About one-half of the terrorists resided, planned, and prepared for terrorism relatively close to their eventual target. The terrorist groups existed for 1,205 days from the first planning meeting to the date of the actual/planned terrorist incident. The planning process for specific acts began 2-3 months prior to the terrorist incident. This study examined selected terrorist groups/incidents in the U.S. from 1980-2002. It provides for the potential to identify patterns of conduct that might lead to intervention prior to the commission of the actual terrorist incidents. Illustrations.

Download or read book Imperial Hearst written by Ferdinand Lundberg and published by ibooks. This book was released on 2017-12-18 with total page 487 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hearst’s journalistic ethics were probably never more clearly exposed than during the national election campaign of 1936. It is true that eighty per cent of the newspapers in the United States spread slanders and calumnies against the President. But the Hearst organs pulled all the stops and thundered vilification with all the resources at their command. The President was portrayed as a lunatic, a wastrel arid a cartoonist’s version of a frothing Communist. Picture and text described him and his advisers as dangerously radical, malicious and altogether feeble-minded. The Hearst press did not hesitate to attribute the source of Roosevelt’s social legislation to Moscow. Nor did consistency deter Hearst from charging plagiarism from Hitler and Mussolini. His newspapers shouted denunciation and abuse. Sound familiar? This work is the only complete exposition of the financial, political and social results of the career of William Randolph Hearst.

Download or read book Carl Weber s Kingpins Charlotte 2 written by Blake Karrington and published by Urban Books. This book was released on 2024-07-23 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this highly anticipated sequel and finale, Blake Karrington once again takes you into the world of Ronnie King and Sloan Devaxx. For Sloan, life couldn't be more perfect. She has the man of her dreams and is beginning the career that she has always envisioned. But Deshawn, her ex, is determined to take them away from her. Meanwhile, King is facing one of the hardest trials of his life as he is falsely accused of murder and must fight for his freedom and his life. The truth can be harder to prove than a lie, especially when the liar is a public servant. His one saving grace is knowing that his family and the love of his life are there to back him every step of the way. Heavy is the head that wears the crown. Will King still be on the throne when the smoke clears?

Download or read book Focus written by Michael Gross and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2016-07-05 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “This thoroughly absorbing narrative dazzles with the most profound investigation and research. Focus is an enthralling and riveting read.” —Tim Gunn “Smart, well-researched…engaging…canny” (New York Times Book Review), Focus is a “fast-paced—and clearly insider—look at the rarefied, sexy world of fashion photography” (Lauren Weisberger, author of The Devil Wears Prada). New York Times bestselling author Michael Gross brings to life the wild genius, egos, passions, and antics of the men (and a few women) behind the camera, probing the lives, hang-ups, and artistic triumphs of more than a dozen of fashion photography’s greatest visionaries, including Richard Avedon, Irving Penn, Bill King, Helmut Newton, Gilles Bensimon, Bruce Weber, Steven Meisel, and Bob and Terry Richardson. Tracing the highs and lows of fashion photography from the late 1940s to today, Focus takes you behind the scenes to reveal the revolutionary creative processes and fraught private passions of these visionary magicians, “delving deep into the fascinating rivalries” (The Daily News) between photographers, fashion editors, and publishers like Condé Nast and Hearst. Weaving together candid interviews, never-before-told insider anecdotes and insights born of his three decades of front-row and backstage reporting on modern fashion, Focus is “simply unrivaled…a sensation….Gross is a modern-day Vasari, giving us The Lives of the Artists in no small measure” (CraveOnline).

Download or read book Model written by Michael Gross and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2011-10-18 with total page 578 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Investigative journalist Michael Gross delves into the history of models and takes us into the private studios and hidden villas where models play and are preyed upon, going beyond modeling’s carefully constructed facade of glamour to expose the scandal and untold truths that permeate the seemingly glamorous business. Here for the first time is the complete story of the international model business—and its evil twin: legalized flesh peddling. It’s a tale of vast sums of money, rape both symbolic and of the flesh, sex and drugs, obsession and tragic death. At its heart is the most unholy combination in commerce: beautiful, young women and rich, lascivious men. Fashion insider Michael Gross has interviewed modeling’s pioneers, survivors, and hangers–on, and he tells the story of the greats: Lisa Fonssagrives; Anita Colby, Candy Jones; Dorian Leigh and her sister Suzy Parker; Jean Shrimpton and Twiggy; Veruschka and Lauren Hutton; and today’s supermodel trinity, Christy, Naomi and Linda.