Axel Madsen

As the silent films of the Roaring Twenties gave way to the Depression-Era talkies, few people were aware of the furtive Tinseltown sisterhood of women in love with women. Here is the documented story of the clandestine lesbian community whose members included Greta Garbo, Marlene Dietrich, Tallulah Bankhead, and countless others. Three 8-page photo inserts.

Hollywood's Greatest Secret: Female Stars Who Loved Other Women

The Sewing Circle

How William C. Durant Made General Motors

The Deal Maker

An Unauthorized Biography

Cousteau

Alex Madsen brings to life Gabrielle "Coco" Chanel, the queen of fashion who revolutionized women's styles forever.

A Woman of Her Own

Chanel

Chronicles Gabrielle Chanel's remarkable climb from poverty to the forefront of the international fashion industry and explores her illustrious collection of friends and lovers

Coco Chanel's genius for fashion may have been distilled in simplicity, but her life was an extravaganza. A brilliant array of luminaries fell under her spell - Picasso, Churchill, cocteau- lovers included the Grand Duke Dmitri; the English roue, Boy Capel; a French poet- a German spy and the Duke of Westminster, who offered to leave his wife for her permanently, if she would bear him an heir. Paradoxically, though she might have been regarded in some lights as a pioneering feminist - sacrificing marriage to a revolutionary career in couture - Chanel was utterly baffled by the idea of women's politics. Educated women? 'A woman's education consists of two lessons- never leave the house without stockings, never go out without a hat.' Chanel's rise from penniless orphan to millionaire designer - 'inventing' sportswear, the little black dress and No 5 - makes compelling reading, not least because she was inclined to design her own life as deftly as she did her fashions. Axel Madsen negotiates Chanel's smoke screens with skill, bringing this tantalising woman to life in all her alluring complexity.

A Biography

Coco Chanel

A fascinating look at the real Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel, the designer who forever revolutionized the way women look. She was a free spirit, brilliant business woman, and beauty who never found reciprocated love. Madsen, with authority, delves into this fashion doyenne’s business and private lives to reveal one woman’s extraordinary progress: from orphan to millinery shopkeeper, from lodestar of feminine style to a very rich woman with a closet full of dark secrets.

Looks at the life and career of Marshall Field, discussing how he built his department store empire, and the tragedy which surrounds the succeeding Field generations.

The Evolution of an American Business Dynasty

The Marshall Fields

The authorized biography of the celebrated film director William Wyler, a giant in his craft, who directed such classics as Ben-Hur, Funny Girl, and Roman Holiday.

The Authorized Biography

William Wyler

Simone de Beauvoir en Jean-Paul Sartre

Sonia Delaunay, wife of painter Robert Delaunay, and co-founder of the Orphist school in 1910, was the center of a brilliant circle in Paris. Madsen offers a rich and compelling look at this fascinating and influential woman, the first living female artist to have a retrospective show at the Louvre.

Artist of the Lost Generation

Sonia Delaunay

The ultimate Hollywood story revealed: the sizzling relationship between Joseph Kennedy, patriarch of America’s most influential political family, and Gloria Swanson, one of the most prominent silent film stars of her day. Gloria and Joe were in love with each other and with the movies, especially Queen Kelly, which completed the real-life ménage à trois. Starring along with the star of the screen and the Boston Brahman in this exposé are Erich von Stroheim, Kennedy’s wife Rose, Swanson’s husband, and a cast of colorful hangers-on. Madsen recreates their love, scandal, and world, which in its extravagance and intrigue has never been surpassed.

The Star-Crossed Love Affair of Gloria Swanson and Joe Kennedy

Gloria and Joe

The roller-coaster life of the flamboyant creator of General Motors William C. Durant did big things the big way: he overreached, but, until his final failure, he picked up the pieces time after time to confound his competitors. From a turbulent childhood in the small town of Flint, Michigan, to his phenomenal success in creating General Motors, Durant's meteoric career easily rivals the success stories of modern legends like Ted Turner, Rupert Murdoch, and Bill Gates. With his trademark smile and personal charisma, Durant assembled General Motors in a few short years, buying companies at the rate of one every thirty days. Durant's deal-making artistry even tempted Henry Ford, and had Durant upped his acquisition price Ford would be a division of GM today. Durant's story illuminates the conflict between innovation and control of innovation -of the uneasy alliances struck again and again between inventors and their sources of capital. His years of heady success building General Motors were marked by epic struggles with bankers. But he depended on only a few sources of big money to finance his exploding business, and pitted himself against forces he underestimated or refused to consider. Gambling on a run on GM stock, he was finally forced into a buyout that ousted him from his role in the GM empire. Into the dramatic tale of this early twentieth-century mogul come the fascinating automotive pioneers -Henry Ford, David Buick, Charles Nash, Albert Champion, Louis Chevrolet, and Alfred P. Sloan. On Wall Street, J. P. Morgan turned down Durant's request for a loan while Pierre du Pont invested in Durant's expansion. Tracing the fortunes of a man and his era, The Deal Maker is a fast-paced, rousing tale of Durant's dizzying success and ultimate failure.

The Common Journey of Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre

Hearts and Minds

Billy Wilder

A dual biography of the two most influential socio-political moralists of the twentieth century, whose lives were intertwined personally and intellectually for more than forty-six years. Madsen provides an engrossing view of the luminously transparent relationship that was unconventional yet faithful to its ideals.

One of the greatest art theft stories of the 20th century: André Malraux, French novelist, art theorist, and eventually France’s Minister of Cultural Affairs, and his wife, Clara, traveled to Cambodia in 1923, planning to steal and smuggle artifacts out of the country and sell them in America. The Cambodian treasure hunt promised to be a mix of cultural sleuthing for important antiquities and risk-taking on the fuzzy edge of the laws that governed historical sites. The jungle expedition ended in arrest and, for André, trial and conviction. But it also led to a second Asian venture: the launching of a Saigon newspaper, L’Indochine, dedicated to the aspirations of the indigenous population. Madsen follows the couple from this fateful adventure that so shaped their future to the end of their marriage, and after.

Axel Madsen

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