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List Price: $16.95 | | Publisher: Blood Moon Productions
Salesrank: 132708
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| Our Price: $9.50 |
| Used Price: $2.61 |
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| Media: Paperback |
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Editorial Review:
This is the provocative story of young Bogart's offscreen odyssey during the early days of Talking Pictures. It's based on never-before-published memoirs, letters, diaries, and interviews from the women and men who loved him. It also contains revelations from former friends and lovers who wanted him to burn in hell. No wonder Bogie, during his later life, never wanted to talk about his early years.
Learn at last what was really beneath the trenchcoat of America's most famous male movie star. Bogart probably never told ANY of this to Bacall.
The Secret Life of Humphrey Bogart: The Early Years (1899-1931) Reviews:
A truly hateful book 
2009-05-10 - This was the most nasty, filthy book I have ever read. Well, I only read half of it and could not stomach any more. I recently removed it from my bookcase and shredded every single page. I ran the Bogart/Bacall fan club from 1946 to 1951, Bogie would have sued this author if he had written this before his death. For all Bogart fans....DO NOT BUY OR READ THIS TERRIBLE BOOK.
Wonderful Parody/Satire of the stars. 
2009-03-18 - This is an enjoyable read! It's funny and over the top, and of course it's all baloney, but that is what makes this book so enjoyable. Best satire/parody I have read in years. Think of the Warner Brothers cartoons poking fun at Bogie and Robinson and add in a little bi-sexuality and you will understand this " biography." Finally, someone has given all these wooden movie stars a personality. What would Ms. Bacall say? "Falwell vs. Hustler Magazine." Lighten up out there in reviewer land.
Beaten to a Pulp Fiction
2007-09-10 - I stumbled upon this book with its extensive online excerpts while researching Eva Von Berne, a Viennese actress-model discovered by Irving Thalberg and Norma Shearer on their 1927 honeymoon. Miss Von Berne was brought to the U.S. and MGM publicists immediately began releasing press stories for fear they would repeat their earlier mistake of believing that little would become of another MGM import, Greta Garbo. But in this case the 17 year old Von Berne couldn't act and was slightly overweight (120 lbs.!) She was sent back to Europe on a boat where she made three more films before she passed away. The point being that she was only in the U.S. a short time, that it is unlikely that Thalberg would have been having sex with her on his honeymoon, and even less likely that Von Berne would have been around to commment on the Jean Harlow-Paul Bern nuptials since she died before the engagement was announced. Hollywood is FULL of people who like to trash stars - both dead and alive - and writers who believe these unreliable stories and use both the tellers of the tales and the dead celebrities to make money. This includes marginally more responsible writers who have axes to grind and want all stars to be ambisexual. I'm not suprised no one has sued him because doing so would give this book waaaaay more publicity than it deserves. Its a word version of the 1930's "Tijuana Bibles" that used the same content, only pictorially.
Skip this one unless you love the tabloids!
2007-06-20 - Totally agree with all the negative reviews about this book! I've gotten up to chapter 6, after about 2 weeks of reading, and I'm not sure I can go on. Porter barely talks about Bogie's early career except to say which costar he had his eye on. The detailed conversations included make me wonder if everyone in Hollywood was also wearing a wire besides sleeping with everyone. Even if this is based on part of the journals kept by MacKenna and others, no one I know writes in that much detail. Especially when they weren't there to witness the event in the first place. I'm torn between finishing this book to see if anything remotely interesting about Bogie's career is revealed, and my pride of always finishing a book I start, or just tossing it back onto the bookcase to await the next book drive at the YMCA. I wonder if it's took late to my money back? I feel dirty contributing my money to this kind of sleazy so-called biography. And to those who rated this 5 stars, did you copy your review straight from the book's back cover or the publisher's press release? If you're die hard fan of the supermarket tabloids and need some juicy gossip, filled with some soft core porn, then this book is for you. Otherwise, skip it!
Mean-spirited hogwash
2007-05-24 - That this trash is a hideous pack of lies is a given. Did it ever occur to this Porter imbecile that all the dead people he delights in lewdly slandering have descendents? How does he think THEY feel? Such gutless, tasteless lying to sell a couple of books. His lies about the great Glenda Farrell border on criminal. THERE OUGHT TO BE A LAW!!
