Politics Entertainment

Frank Sinatra. Dean Martin. Sammy Davis, Jr. Peter Lawford. Joey Bishop. They call themselves The Clan. But to an awed world, they are known as The Rat Pack. They had it all. Fame. Gorgeous women. A fabulous playground of a city and all the money in the world. The backing of fearsome crime lords and the blessing of the President of the United States. But the dark side - over the thin line between pleasure and debauchery, between swinging self-confidence and brutal arrogance - took its toll. In four years, their great ride was over, and showbiz was never the same.

Dive into the moral philosophy at the heart of all four seasons of NBC's The Good Place, guided by academic experts, including the show's philosophical consultants Pamela Hieronymi and Todd May, and featuring a foreword from creator and showrunner Michael Schur.

From backrooms of Max's and CBGB's to the Tropicana Hotel in Los Angeles and back, Punk Avenue is a tour de force of stories from someone at the heart of the era. With brilliant, often hilarious prose, Phil Marcade relays first-hand tales about spending a Provincetown summer with photographer Nan Goldin and actor-writer Cookie Mueller, having the Ramones play their very first gig at his party, working with Blondie's Debbie Harry on French lyrics for her songs, enjoying Thanksgiving with Johnny Thunders' mother, and starting the beloved NYC punk-blues band The Senders.

Henry Fonda and James Stewart were two of the biggest stars in Hollywood for 40 years. They became friends and then roommates as stage actors in New York, and when they began making films in Hollywood, they roomed together again. Between them they made such memorable films as The Grapes of Wrath, Mister Roberts, Twelve Angry Men, and On Golden Pond; and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Destry Rides Again, The Philadelphia Story, It's a Wonderful Life, Vertigo, and Rear Window.

Are you a big fan of Harry Potter? You’ve probably read the books and seen the films many times over. But how much of the detail behind the series do you really know? This special audiobook collection contains three individual audiobooks: 101 Amazing Facts About Harry Potter, 101 More Amazing Books About Harry Potter and 101 Amazing Facts About J.K. Rowling. Separated into sections for easy listening, there is a huge amount of information that will surprise and amaze you in equal measure!

In a strange world where she was continually on display, stardom soon became a personal nightmare of constant exposure and sexualization. Rose escaped into the world of her mind, something she had done as a child, and into high-profile relationships. Every detail of her personal life became public, and the realities of an inherently sexist industry emerged with every script, role, public appearance, and magazine cover. The Hollywood machine packaged her as a sexualized bombshell, hijacking her image and identity and marketing them for profit.

Al Franken, Giant of the Senate is a book about an unlikely campaign that had an even more improbable ending: the closest outcome in history and an unprecedented eight-month recount saga, which is pretty funny in retrospect. It's a book about what happens when the nation's foremost progressive satirist gets a chance to serve in the United States Senate and, defying the low expectations of the pundit class, actually turns out to be good at it.

For the first time, Slipknot and Stone Sour frontman Corey Taylor speaks directly to his fans and shares his worldview about life as a sinner. And Taylor knows how to sin. As a small-town hero in the early '90s, he threw himself into a fierce-drinking, drug-abusing, hard-loving, live-for-the-moment life. Soon Taylor's music exploded, and he found himself rich, wanted, and on the road. His new and ever-more-extreme lifestyle had an unexpected effect, however; for the first time, he began to actively think about what it meant to sin.

Hearts on Fire is about the creative explosion in Canadian music of the early 2000s, which captured the world's attention in entirely new ways. The Canadian wave didn't just sweep over one genre or one city, it stretched from coast to coast, affecting large bands and solo performers, rock bands and DJs, and it connected to international scenes by capitalizing on new technology and old-school DIY methods.

It has been three decades since Nirvana upended the pop cultural landscape with Nevermind, the landmark album that became the soundtrack of Generation X, capturing its confusion, frustration, and passion. In 1993, Michael Azerrad published what stands as the definitive biography of this revolutionary band and its star-crossed leader Kurt Cobain. Written with the band’s complete cooperation—the only book to feature interviews with Cobain, bassist Krist Novoselic, and drummer Dave Grohl—it became a massive bestseller and, in the words of Cobain, "the best rock book I’ve ever read.”

Alex Ross, renowned New Yorker music critic and author of the international best seller and Pulitzer Prize finalist The Rest Is Noise, reveals how Richard Wagner became the proving ground for modern art and politics - an aesthetic war zone where the Western world wrestled with its capacity for beauty and violence.

In the age of Trump and Brexit, every crisis is instantly overridden by the next. The turbulent political weather of the 21st century generates anxiety and makes it difficult to know how to react. Laing makes an inspiring case for why art matters more than ever, as a force of both resistance and repair. Art, she argues, changes how we see the world. It gives us X-ray vision. It reveals inequalities and offers fertile new ways of living. Funny Weather brings together a career's worth of Laing's writing about art and culture, and their role in our political and emotional lives.

Bestselling author James Kaplan redefines Frank Sinatra in a triumphant new biography that includes many rarely seen photographs. Frank Sinatra was the best-known entertainer of the twenti­eth century—infinitely charismatic, lionized and notori­ous in equal measure.

Following a run of New Year's concerts at San Francisco's legendary Fillmore, Patti Smith finds herself tramping the coast of Santa Cruz, about to embark on a year of solitary wandering. Unfettered by logic or time, she draws us into her private wonderland with no design, yet heeding signs - including a talking sign that looms above her, prodding and sparring like the Cheshire Cat. In February, a surreal lunar year begins, bringing with it unexpected turns, mischief, and inescapable sorrow. In a stranger's words, "Anything is possible: after all, it's the Year of the Monkey."

There is a common belief that we live in unprecedented times, that people are too sensitive today, that nobody objected to the actions of actors, comedians, and filmmakers in the past. Modern pundits would have us believe that Americans of a previous generation had tougher skin and seldom complained. But does this argument hold up to scrutiny? In Outrageous, celebrated cultural historian Kliph Nesteroff demonstrates that Americans have been objecting to entertainment for nearly two hundred years, sometimes rationally, often irrationally.

Forged in the stress of early motherhood, The Mother Artist explores the fraught yet generative ties between caregiving and creative practice. As a young mother working at a museum, essayist Catherine Ricketts began asking questions about the making of motherhood and the making of art. Now, with incantatory prose and an intuitive gaze, she twines intimate meditations on parenthood with studies of the work and lives of painters, writers, dancers, musicians, and other creatives.

What would happen to international politics if the dead rose from the grave and started to eat the living? Daniel Drezner's groundbreaking book answers the question that other international relations scholars have been too scared to ask. Addressing timely issues with analytical bite, Drezner looks at how well-known theories from international relations might be applied to a war with zombies.

The second volume of the Lost & Found Sound collection explores how recorded sound has shaped and captured the history of the last 100 years. Drawing from the archives and attics of the nation, this historic and intimate collection of radio documentaries presents a compelling array of sonic pioneers and legends, eccentric collectors, and original American voices.

This audiobook is Nick Carter's autobiography and self-help hybrid, in which he chronicles his struggles with a dysfunctional family and the unimaginable rigors of becoming an internationally successful pop-star at the age of 12. From his battle with addiction to serious health complications and the pain of his younger sister's tragic death, Nick leaves nothing to the imagination and offers true and heartfelt advice to help listeners overcome obstacles in their own lives.

Though they have the vote and the Pill and haven't been burned as witches since 1727, life isn't exactly a stroll down the catwalk for modern women. They are beset by uncertainties and questions: Why are they supposed to get Brazilians? Why do bras hurt? Why the incessant talk about babies? And do men secretly hate them? Caitlin Moran interweaves provocative observations on women's lives with laugh-out-loud funny scenes from her own, from adolescence to her development as a writer, wife, and mother.