A Death In Beverly Hills

When the pregnant wife and four year old stepdaughter of fading movie star Tom Travis disappear a massive search is launched. Soon after the body of Travis’ wife is discovered only a few miles from where Tom had been riding his dune buggy on the day she vanished he's arrested and placed on trial for capital murder. Only a days away from an almost certain guilty verdict Travis’ lawyer hires suspended Ex-Deputy D.A. Steve Janson to try to find some overlooked clue that might keep Travis off death row. Janson accepts the assignment, not to help Travis, but in the faint hope of finding the missing child still alive. Janson’s investigation leads him on a twisted path from Travis’ mistress to her drug-dealing brother to the writer and producer of his Travis’ last movie and on across the landscape of Southern California until Janson eventually begins to wonder if Travis might really be innocent after all. Visit David Grace's web site at WWW.DavidGraceAuthor.Com

A top-ranking executive of a Hollywood movie studio finds his starlet wife and associates under investigation when a screenwriter friend is targeted by witch hunters from the House Un-American Activities Committee. By the author of The Prince of Beverly Hills.

The very name Beverly Hills conjures images of glamour, wealth and success; in reality, the place has more than its share of malice, mayhem and even murder. In the breathtaking and sometimes macabre pages of Beverly Hills Confidential, the underbelly of the tummy-tucked gets exposed. Investigative reporter Barbara Schroeder and BHPD CSI inspector Clark Fogg re-examine the sensational stories of the past century, such as the Charlie Chaplin paternity trial and the mystery surrounding the death of Jean Harlow's MGM mogul husband.

This book focuses on the life, adventures, tragedies and the plight of one teenager growing up in Beverly Hills during the early 70's drug atmosphere and lifestyle. Book I, is about one teenager's courage and willpower to overcome enormous obstacles in her life, amongst a death sentence from the fledgling Neurological profession in that era. The book also takes a look at the young psychiatric system and it's neophyte facilities; it also explains the archaic use of these facilities available at that time. Life in Beverly Hills during the 60's and 70's could truly be called "surviving "Beverly Hills." Regardless of money or power during the era of freedom, "rock and roll," sex and the "Hippy" mentality still affects generation's to this day. Even saying that you grew up in Beverly Hills still carries a heavy stigma today.

Literally the last word for Hollywood trivia buffs, a celebrity death certificate is also strangely compelling. Its matter-of-fact reportage makes the famous ordinary, illuminating previously well-lit profiles with the unfiltered light of the everyday. A death certificate may also reveal information that stars assiduously concealed, such as actual birthdates. In California, home to many of Hollywood's brightest stars, death certificates are a matter of public record--and consequently an untapped mine of information. This follow-up to M.F. Steen's previous collection (2003) reproduces in full 169 of the death certificates of the entertainment industry's dearly departed. Brief biographical notes are included, listing birth and professional name as well as notable film, TV and entertainment credits. Mel Blanc, Lorne Greene, John Ritter, Gregory Peck, and Ronald Reagan are just a few of Hollywood's notables whose death certificates are collected here.

For more than a century, people have been drawn to sites of tragedy involving the rich, beautiful and notorious of Hollywood. Tourists at the center of the movie universe flock to Rudolph Valentino's grave, the house where Marilyn Monroe died, the "O.J. murders" condo, the hotel where John Belushi overdosed, a myriad of haunted mansions. In its extensively researched and enlarged second edition, this book tells the stories of these locations and makes finding them simple. Seventeen driving tours include more than 650 sites. Each tour covers a specific area, from Hollywood and the Sunset Strip to Brentwood and Malibu, covering the entire Los Angeles basin. Concise, easy-to-follow directions are given to each location with 145 photos and the fascinating story behind each stop.

A troubled Los Angeles socialite is both terrorized and tempted by a killer in this “brilliantly written” true story by the author of A Death in Canaan (Ann Rule). Hope Masters lived in one of the most exclusive neighborhoods in Beverly Hills—but was entitled to food stamps. Pretty, petite, and privileged, she was recovering from two failed marriages and a string of poor decisions. But when Hope met and fell in love with a handsome advertising executive, she believed her life was finally back on track—until the morning she woke up to find the barrel of a gun in her mouth. Hope’s fiancé lay dead in the next room. His killer was a new acquaintance who’d been visiting the couple in a remote ranch in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains. He claimed to be a journalist, but his real identity was as mysterious as his motivations. Even more bizarre, however, was what happened at the end of the long, nightmarish weekend in which Hope saw everything she cared about destroyed: She began to fall in love with her tormenter. A fascinating and frightening portrait of the power of evil to lead the most innocent of victims down the darkest of paths, A Death in California is “a first-rate piece of reporting” (Kirkus Reviews) on “one of the strangest cases in the annals of American crime” (The New York Times).

Growing up, Susan Berman's childhood was idyllic. She was Las Vegas Mob royalty, the daughter of a Mob boss who ran the Flamingo and furnished his only child with anything money could buy. But halfway through her childhood, dream exploded. Susan's father died without warning during a routine surgery. Next, Susie Berman's mother died by her own hand the next year when she overdosing on drugs. Susie was whisked away from the only home she'd ever known, parentless and living with an uncle and his family and sent away to boarding school. Fast forward to college where Susan met her soul mate, Robert Durst. They became best friends and each other's confidants. Durst went to work for his wealthy father at the Durst Organization in Manhattan while Susan became a journalist, writing about women's cultural issues for newspapers and magazines. She followed Durst to New York, where he married the beautiful Kathie McCormack. Then, Kathie disappeared and Susan stood by her best friend Robert, despite suspicions that Durst had caused the demise of his wife. Twenty years later, as police closed in on Durst and reopened the case, seeking to interview his best friends, Susan was murdered. Few clues were found. Who did it and why? Was it the Mob? A trusted friend? Murder in Beverly Hills (an updated, revised edition of Murder of a Mafia Daughter) answers those questions. Exclusive information about the investigation is included in this edition, as well as new interviews of police detectives, Susan's friends, family and colleagues, and new information about Robert Durst is revealed.