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Widespread panic : a novel  Cover Image Book Book

Widespread panic : a novel / James Ellroy.

Summary:

"Freddy Otash is the man in the know and the man to know in Tinseltown. He operates with two simple rules--he'll do anything but murder, and he'll never work with commies. Freddy is a corrupt L.A. cop on the skids. He executed a cop killer named Horvath and it gores him. So Captain "Whiskey" Bill Parker cans him. Now, Freddy dons an array of new hats--sleazoid private eye, shakedown artist, matchmaker for Rock Hudson, pimp for President John F. Kennedy--and, most notably--the lead tipster and head strongarm goon for Confidential magazine. Confidential presaged the idiot internet--and delivered the dirt, the dish, the insidious ink and the scurrilous skank on the feckless foibles of misanthropic movie stars, sex-soiled socialites, and putzo politicians. Freaky Freddy outs them all! In Widespread Panic we traverse the depths of '50s L.A. and internalize the inner workings of Confidential. Dig: You'll go to Burt Lancaster's lushly appointed torture den ... You'll gas on overhyped legend James Dean as Freddy's chief stooge ... You'll be there for Freddy's ring-a-ding rendezvous with Liz Taylor ... You'll be front and center as Freddy runs roughshod over the stars of the silver screen and the demimonde of the Hollywood hills"-- Provided by publisher.

Record details

  • ISBN: 9780593319345 (hardcover)
  • Physical Description: 319 pages ; 24 cm
  • Edition: First edition.
  • Publisher: New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 2021.

Content descriptions

General Note:
"Borzoi book."
Subject: Nineteen fifties > Fiction.
Los Angeles (Calif.) > Fiction.
Genre: Noir fiction.
Historical fiction.

Available copies

  • 1 of 1 copy available at Tsuga Consortium.

Holds

  • 0 current holds with 1 total copy.
Show Only Available Copies
Location Call Number / Copy Notes Barcode Shelving Location Status Due Date
Lakeshore Branch LP FIC Ellro 31681010241636 LARGEPT Available -

  • Baker & Taylor
    "Freddy Otash is the man in the know and the man to know in Tinseltown. He operates with two simple rules--he'll do anything but murder, and he'll never work with commies. Freddy is a corrupt L.A. cop on the skids. He executed a cop killer named Horvath and it gores him. So Captain "Whiskey" Bill Parker cans him. Now, Freddy dons an array of new hats--sleazoid private eye, shakedown artist, matchmaker for Rock Hudson, pimp for President John F. Kennedy--and, most notably--the lead tipster and head strongarm goon for Confidential magazine. Confidential presaged the idiot internet--and delivered the dirt, the dish, the insidious ink and the scurrilous skank on the feckless foibles of misanthropic movie stars, sex-soiled socialites, and putzo politicians. Freaky Freddy outs them all! In Widespread Panic we traverse the depths of '50s L.A. and internalize the inner workings of Confidential. Dig: You'll go to Burt Lancaster's lushly appointed torture den. . . You'll gas on overhyped legend James Dean as Freddy's chief stooge. . . You'll be there for Freddy's ring-a-ding rendezvous with Liz Taylor. . . You'll be front and center as Freddy runs roughshod over the stars of the silver screen and the demimonde of the Hollywood hills"--
  • Baker & Taylor
    In the 1950s, Freddy Otash, the Tattle Tyrant for Confidential magazine who held Hollywood hostage, decides to tell all, in this tale of pervasive paranoia teeming with communist conspiracies, FBI finks, celebrity smut films, and strange bedfellows.
  • Random House, Inc.
    From the modern master of noir comes a novel based on the real-life Hollywood fixer Freddy Otash, the malevolent monarch of the 1950s L.A. underground, and his Tinseltown tabloid Confidential magazine.

    Freddy Otash was the man in the know and the man to know in ‘50s L.A. He was a rogue cop, a sleazoid private eye, a shakedown artist, a pimp—and, most notably, the head strong-arm goon for Confidential magazine.
     
    Confidential presaged the idiot internet—and delivered the dirt, the dish, the insidious ink, and the scurrilous skank. It mauled misanthropic movie stars, sex-soiled socialites, and putzo politicians. Mattress Jack Kennedy, James Dean, Montgomery Clift, Burt Lancaster, Liz Taylor, Rock Hudson—Frantic Freddy outed them all. He was the Tattle Tyrant who held Hollywood hostage, and now he’s here to CONFESS.
     
    “I’m consumed with candor and wracked with recollection. I’m revitalized and resurgent. My meshugenah march down memory lane begins NOW.”
     
    In Freddy’s viciously entertaining voice, Widespread Panic torches 1950s Hollywood to the ground. It’s a blazing revelation of coruscating corruption, pervasive paranoia, and of sin and redemption with nothing in between.
     
    Here is James Ellroy in savage quintessence. Freddy Otash confesses—and you are here to read and succumb.

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