Bøger af Stephen Greco

How big can a media deal be? Can Hollywood improve the condition of humanity even a little bit, with a feel-good movie designed to reach every screen on the planet? Other People's Prayers tells the tale of a five powerful individuals who intend to make "the biggest movie ever," meant to inspire the entire world with hope. The result, however, is the murder of one of the movie's champions. There's Allyn, the New York society girl who's now a producer; Okeyo, the Nigerian-Swiss priest who inherits both his mother's sacred calling and his father's fortune; and John, the investor who keeps the movie's young star wrapped around his finger. Continuing the story begun in Stephen Greco's The Culling - of John Statella, the handsome, seductive panhandler-turned-world-class financial mogul - Other People's Prayers tells of a dream gone wrong. As John attempts to use the empire he took over to influence the movie meant to change the world, he discovers himself opposed to Allyn, the very person who brought him into the deal in the first place. Set in the fast-paced media capitals of New York and Los Angeles, with glimpses into the tranquil garden of a ruined synagogue and a massive rally in a Berlin arena, Other People's Prayers asks whether good intentions can scale up via media projects of unprecedented scope, to do good on a planetary scale.

Spare, dry, and flecked with dark humor, Stephen Greco's Dreadnought centers on a fictional American corporation selling goods and services to a global youth market of a billion souls. Like Mount Fuji in Hokusai's Thirty-Six Views, the Dreadnought corporation - creator of "the biggest brand in history" - is visible directly or obliquely in each of these interrelated stories, which tell of who wins and who loses when young consumers and creative talent are stalked by a Big Brand of unprecedented power. Hint: Everybody loses - but the party's fun while it lasts. The novel's six tales are all set in New York's fast-lane of fashion, media, and the arts-populated chiefly by young people with more money, power, and influence than they know what to do with: "Forensics," "No Hat For Dinner," "Kate Neiring," "48 Huron Street," "The Demographer," and "General Everything."

Is it better to improve the life of just one homeless person than donate millions to the arts? This is the question puzzling Selwyn Stanfield, a billionaire media mogul who has grown tired of life in New York's fast lane and talks about retiring to Katmandu. After years of philanthropy fueled by his success in developing global markets, Selwyn decides to befriend - and then employ - a panhandler named John, whom the mogul has ignored guiltily for months at the door of the local ATM. But John turns out to be the wrong choice. Fast paced, with dark, dry humor, The Culling tell of John's transformation from Salvation Army to Prada. At first John appears to fit into the bold-face lifestyle enjoyed by Selwyn and his wife, MaryAnn, a well-connected art dealer. The former panhandler charms ladies and gentlemen alike, and demonstrates street savvy that serves him well in Selwyn's business. But then, after befriending Selwyn's business partners and seducing MaryAnn, John's past catches up with him - a grim past of drugs, family violence, and the inner sanctum at Studio 54. By the end of the story Selwyn is missing and may or may not have gone to the life of an ascetic in Katmandu. Blending narrative subtlety with self-reflexive irony, The Culling works on two levels. First, it is the drama of one human being trying to help another. On another level, the novel is a commentary on the ability of good - and good business - to propagate itself in the modern world. Like anti-heroes from Balzac and Highsmith, John seduces the reader into empathizing with him even as his actions defy moral standards.

The housekeeper for the sister of Jackie Kennedy, Her Serene Highness Lee Radziwill, Marlene meets celebrated author Truman Capote, and when he takes her under his wing as a writer, she sees his darker side--especially his penchant for mining his friends' private lives for material.

In the three decades since Peter first moved into his Brooklyn apartment, almost every facet of his life has changed. Once a broke, ambitious poet, Peter is now a successful advertising executive. He's grateful for everything the years have given him-wealth, friends, security. But he's conscious too of what time has taken in return, and a busy stream of invitations doesn't dull the ache that remains since he lost the love of his life. Will is a young, aspiring journalist hungry for everything New York has to offer-culture, sophistication, adventure. When he moonlights as a bartender at one of Peter's parties, the two strike up a tentative friendship that soon becomes more important than either expected. In Peter, Will sees the ease and confidence he strives for, while Peter is suddenly aware of just how lonely his life has become. But forging a connection means navigating very different sets of experience and expectations, as each decides how to make a place for himself in the world-and who to share it with. Beautifully written, warm yet incisive, Now and Yesterday offers a fascinating exploration of two generations-and of the complex, irrefutable power of friendship-through the prism of an eternally changing city.