In The Heat Of The Night

African-American police detective Virgil Tibbs solves a murder in a racist Southern small town.

In The Heat of the Day, Elizabeth Bowen brilliantly recreates the tense and dangerous atmosphere of London during the bombing raids of World War II. Many people have fled the city, and those who stayed behind find themselves thrown together in an odd intimacy born of crisis. Stella Rodney is one of those who chose to stay. But for her, the sense of impending catastrophe becomes acutely personal when she discovers that her lover, Robert, is suspected of selling secrets to the enemy, and that the man who is following him wants Stella herself as the price of his silence. Caught between these two men, not sure whom to believe, Stella finds her world crumbling as she learns how little we can truly know of those around us.

For the first time since their breakout debut, Casanegra (Atria Books, 2008), the powerful trio of Blair Underwood, Tananarive Due and Steven Barnes join forces to bring readers back into the sexy and entertaining world of struggling actor and gigolo-turned-sleuth Tennyson Hardwick. This time, Tennyson is faced with the death of a football star who had previously been acquitted of murder - and who had turned to Tennyson for protection not long before his apparent suicide.

Characters: 8 male, 2 femaleAcclaimed playwright Matt Pelfrey's adaptation of John Ball's In the Heat of the Night based on the award-winning book that inspired the Oscar-winning film and the Emmy-winning television series.It's 1962. A hot August night lies heavy over the small town of Argo, Alabama. A dead white man is discovered and the local police arrest a black stranger named Virgil Tibbs. The police discover that their prime suspect is in fact a homicide detective from California. As it happens, Tibbs becomes the racially-tense community's single hope in solving a brutal murder that is turning up no witnesses, no motives, and no clues."A tight and timely thriller!" -Theatermania.com. "It's eminently stageworthy...a tense and exciting story that follows the book's basic plot but offers viewers a distinctly new and different In the Heat of the Night" -CurtainUp. "The play is taut and startlingly resonant, even as it deals with events taking place nearly 50 years ago. Pelfrey's work is economical and uncompromising...suspenseful, thrilling, and stunningly theatrical." -Nytheatre.com.

Stacey Daniels has always been attracted to the wrong type of man . . . And she knows in her heart the virile, wounded Viking at her front doorstep will certainly be no exception. A vision from her most secret erotic fantasies—a glorious god of a man—he excites her with his tantalizing aura of dangerous sensuality. Stacey knows in the deepest depths of her soul that submission will bring unforeseen peril into her life, and yet she is helpless to resist him—for he is a master of decadent pleasures and sweet sensuality . . . and all she has ever wished for. But loving Conor carries a burden that no mortal woman can bear. Though he finds solace in Stacey's passion and the warmth of her welcoming body, his true realm is one of darkest dreams, torn by violence and strife, that is now following him into Stacey's world . . . .

Documents the cultural revolution behind the making of 1967's five Best Picture-nominated films, including Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, The Graduate, Doctor Doolittle, In the Heat of the Night, and Bonnie and Clyde, in an account that discusses how the movies reflected period beliefs about race, violence, and identity. 40,000 first printing.

A small southern town in the 1960s. A dead musician. It's no surprise when white detectives arrest a black man for the murder. What is a surprise is that the black man, Virgil Tibbs, is himself a skilled homicide detective. What's more, he's needed on the case. While the police force adjusts to Tibbs, he delves into the murder, uncovering secrets that incriminate the very people he works with. And this isn't the only challenge he faces; his presence makes the locals uncomfortable. Soon he will have to fight not just for justice, but also for his own safety.

In the first full biography of actor Sidney Poitier, Aram Goudsouzian analyzes the life and career of a Hollywood legend, from his childhood in the Bahamas to his 2002 Oscar for lifetime achievement. Poitier is a gifted actor, a great American success story, an intriguing personality, and a political symbol; his life and career illuminate America's racial history. In such films as Lilies of the Field, In the Heat of the Night, and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, Poitier's middle-class, mannered, virtuous screen persona contradicted prevailing film stereotypes of blacks as half-wits, comic servants, or oversexed threats. His screen image and public support of nonviolent integration assuaged the fears of a broad political center, and by 1968, Poitier was voted America's favorite movie star. Through careful readings of every Poitier film, Goudsouzian shows that Poitier's characters often made sacrifices for the good of whites and rarely displayed sexuality. As the only black leading man during the civil rights era, Poitier chose roles and public positions that negotiated the struggle for dignity. By 1970, times had changed and Poitier was the target of a backlash from film critics and black radicals, as the new heroes of "blaxploitation" movies reversed the Poitier model. In the 1970s, Poitier shifted his considerable talents toward directing, starring in, and producing popular movies that employed many African Americans, both on and off screen. After a long hiatus, he returned to starring roles in the late 1980s. More recently, the film industry has reappraised his career, and Poitier has received numerous honors recognizing his multi-faceted work for black equality in Hollywood. As this biography affirms, Poitier remains one of American popular culture's foremost symbols of the possibilities for and limits of racial equality.