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Books : American Lightning: Terror, Mystery, the Birth of Hollywood, and the Crime of the CenturyIn association with Amazon.comby: Howard Blum  List Price: $24.95 Amazon.com's Price: $16.47 You Save: $8.48 (34%)Prices subject to change. Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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Binding: HardcoverDewey Decimal Number: 364.1523097949409041 EAN: 9780307346940 ISBN: 0307346943 Label: Crown Manufacturer: Crown Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 352 Publication Date: September 16, 2008 Publisher: Crown Release Date: September 16, 2008 Studio: Crown Sales Rank: 8696 Related Items:
Editorial Review: Product Description: It was an explosion that reverberated across the country—and into the very heart of early-twentieth-century America. On the morning of October 1, 1910, the walls of the Los Angeles Times Building buckled as a thunderous detonation sent men, machinery, and mortar rocketing into the night air. When at last the wreckage had been sifted and the hospital triage units consulted, twenty-one people were declared dead and dozens more injured. But as it turned out, this was just a prelude to the devastation that was to come. In American Lightning, acclaimed author Howard Blum masterfully evokes the incredible circumstances that led to the original “crime of the century”—and an aftermath more dramatic than even the crime itself. With smoke still wafting up from the charred ruins, the city’s mayor reacts with undisguised excitement when he learns of the arrival, only that morning, of America’s greatest detective, William J. Burns, a former Secret Service man who has been likened to Sherlock Holmes. Surely Burns, already world famous for cracking unsolvable crimes and for his elaborate disguises, can run the perpetrators to ground. Through the work of many months, snowbound stakeouts, and brilliant forensic sleuthing, the great investigator finally identifies the men he believes are responsible for so much destruction. Stunningly, Burns accuses the men—labor activists with an apparent grudge against the Los Angeles Times’s fiercely anti-union owner—of not just one heinous deed but of being part of a terror wave involving hundreds of bombings. While preparation is laid for America’s highest profile trial ever—and the forces of labor and capital wage hand-to-hand combat in the streets—two other notable figures are swept into the drama: industry-shaping filmmaker D.W. Griffith, who perceives in these events the possibility of great art and who will go on to alchemize his observations into the landmark film The Birth of a Nation; and crusading lawyer Clarence Darrow, committed to lend his eloquence to the defendants, though he will be driven to thoughts of suicide before events have fully played out. Simultaneously offering the absorbing reading experience of a can’t-put-it-down thriller and the perception-altering resonance of a story whose reverberations continue even today, American Lightning is a masterpiece of narrative nonfiction. Average Rating:
 Rating: - Interesting, but a bit uneven.American Lightning gets off to a great start with the bombing of the office of the Los Angeles Times in October 1910, and the introduction of three major players in the story: D.W. Griffith, Billy Burns, and Clarence Darrow. Perhaps the most interesting story is that of Billy Burns, the detective who was hired to discover the parties responsible for the bombing and bring them to justice. Enter Darrow, who defended those responsible J.J. and Jim MacNamara. As a sideline, Blum recounts the development ... Read More Rating:  - THREE'S A CROWDAMERICAN LIGHTNING would be a better book and a better piece of history-writing if Howard Blum had limited himself to giving the reader the portrait of just one American original from the early 20th century instead of three. He should have followed Simon Winchester's example by focusing on the most obscure of the three: William Burns, the greatest detective of his time, founder of a nationwide detective agency that bore his name, and President Harding's choice to head the Bureau of Investigation -- predecessor ... Read More Rating: - and onHoward Blum's American Ligntning offers scant plot, but big historical anecdotes. Mr. Blum tries to tie together the activities from coast-to-coast of the movie industry, the newspaper industry and a private investigator, but it is just too much of a stretch. Although the book catches you up in the beginning, the bouncing back and forth creates a jumbled affect. Rating: - Everything Old is New AgainIf it weren't for books like American Lightning, I'd probably still be a prisoner of a Pavlovian loathing of history instilled by years of deathly-dull date-memorizing history classes. Fortunately, toward the end of high school, Gore Vidal [...] into his novel, Burr: A Novel. I've been hooked ever since. American Lightning is not a novel, but narrative non-fiction. In a novel, the author is free to embroider at will, to create fictional characters and story-lines around the truth. In narrative non ... Read More Rating: - Great caste; great potential; okay plotAmerican Lightning must be a really great book. After all, it starts with a horrendous crime, the bombing of the Los Angeles Times building and the filling of 20 of its employees. It has a stellar cast of larger than life historical characters; attorney Clarence Darrow, director D.W. Griffith, journalist Lincoln Steffens and former secret service agent and detective Bill Burns whose real-life exploits served as the model for Wild Wild West's Jim West. It even ties in the birth of the motion picture industry and the ... Read More Browse for similar items by category:
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