Palm Beach Babylon

Only 12 miles long, Palm Beach has become America's Riviera, with grand Arabian Nights mansions and lavish champagne and caviar parties. The island has turned into the playground of influential industrialists, politicians, aristocrats and diplomats.

Palm Beach, Florida . . . the sultry island paradise where America's rich and famous flock to play, cheat, do drugs, make deals, break the law, and occasionally commit murder. Now award-winning journalists Weiss and Hoffman tell the real story of this American Babylon. 24 pages of photos.

Looks at Palm Beach's scandals, including the battle between Donald and Ivana, the insatiable sexual appetities of the Kennedy brothers, and the bizarre death of a suspect in the JFK assassination

From the first Gilded Age to the second, a “charming, zippy history . . . a rollicking, informative lesson in real estate, American history, and current events.” —Town & Country Looking at the island of Palm Beach today, with its unmatched mansions, tony shops, and pristine beaches, one is hard pressed to visualize the dense tangle of Palmetto brush and mangroves that it was when visionary entrepreneur and railroad tycoon Henry Flagler first arrived there in April 1893. Trusting his remarkable instincts, he built the Royal Poinciana Hotel within a year, and two years later, what was to become the legendary Breakers—instantly establishing the island as the preferred destination for those who could afford it. Over the next 125 years, Palm Beach has become synonymous with exclusivity—especially its most famous residence, Mar-a-Lago. As Les Standiford relates, the high walls of Mar-a-Lago and other manses like it were seemingly designed to contain scandal within as much as keep intruders out. This book tells the history of this fabled landscape intertwined with the colorful lives of its famous and infamous protagonists, from Flagler’s two wives to architect Addison Mizner, who created Palm Beach’s “Mediterranean look” to heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post and her husband E. F. Hutton, the original residents of Mar-a-Lago. With authoritative detail, Standiford recounts how Marjorie ruled Palm Beach society until her death in 1973, and how the fate of her mansion threatened to tear apart the very fabric of the town until Donald Trump acquired it in 1985. “Edifying, energetic, and captivating.” —Florida Weekly

The real story behind a very private American fashion icon?Lilly Pulitzer Today, Lilly Pulitzer's iconic brand of clean-cut, vibrantly printed clothes called "Lillys" can be spotted everywhere. What began decades ago as a snob uniform in Palm Beach became a general fashion craze and, later, an American classic. In contrast to the high visibility of her brand, Lilly Pulitzer has largely kept her tumultuous personal story to herself. Bursting forth into glossy fame from a protected low-key world of great wealth and high society, through heartbreaks, treacheries, scandals, and losses, her life, told in detail here for the first time, is every bit as colorful and exciting as her designs. Offers a close-up of Palm Beach society, replete with tropical mischief, reckless indulgences and blatant infidelities as well as fascinating stories about the Pulitzer and Phipps families and their world of eccentrics, high achievers, intermarriages, and glamorous trendsetters Takes a fresh look at the Roxanne Pulitzer scandal and the atmosphere that fed it, and other episodes involving Lilly Pulitzer's family and social circle Traces the many ups-and-downs in Lilly Pulitzer's personal life as well as her business, which suffered a decline in the 1980s before its resurgent transformation into the thriving success it is today Includes 25 black-and-white photographs that bring Lilly Pulitzer's world to life Lilly of Paradise is must reading not only for fans of Lilly Pulitzer and her Lilly brand, but for anyone interested in a journey through the world of privilege and the life of a true American original.

A behind-the-scenes look at some of the people and events that have played a part in the pop history of the Sunshine State from 1945 to the present

Five torn-from-the-headlines true crime books from an Edgar Award–nominated author and “one of our best reporters” (John Leonard). Linda Wolfe delves deep into the crimes that defy explanation—and the twisted minds of those who commit them. In these five books, she combines masterful storytelling with brilliant psychological insight. Wasted: On an August night in 1986, Jennifer Levin left a Manhattan bar with Robert Chambers. The next morning, her strangled, battered body was found in Central Park. This New York Times Notable Book provides a “fascinating, horrifying, and heart-breaking” account of the so-called Preppie Murder, the crime that shocked a city and a nation (Ann Rule). The Professor and the Prostitute: The chilling case of a college professor who bludgeoned to death the prostitute he loved—plus eight other true crimes, including the bizarre story of the Marcus brothers, twin gynecologists, that inspired the David Cronenberg film Dead Ringers. Double Life: The riveting story of how the chief judge of the New York State Court of Appeals was brought down by his sexual obsession with a stunning socialite. The Murder of Dr. Chapman: Wolfe skillfully weaves court transcripts, love letters, and period recollections into an edge-of-your-seat historical thriller about a notorious crime of passion that rocked pre–Civil War America. Love Me to Death: Wolfe embarks on a search for the serial killer who murdered her friend in this “intriguing insider’s look into the convoluted mind of a killer” (The Plain Dealer).