Dead Man's Curve

Dead Man's Curve
Author: Mark A. Moore
Publisher: McFarland
Total Pages: 526
Release: 2021-08-02
Genre: Music
ISBN: 1476672105

Jan Berry, leader of the music duo Jan & Dean from the late 1950s to mid-1960s, was an intense character who experienced more in his first 25 years than many do in a lifetime. As an architect of the West Coast sound, he was one of rock 'n' roll's original rebels--brilliant, charismatic, reckless, and flawed. As a songwriter, music arranger, and record producer for Nevin-Kirshner Associates and Screen Gems-Columbia Music, Berry was one of the pioneering self-produced artists of his era in Hollywood. He lived a dual life, reaching the top of the charts with Jan & Dean while transitioning from college student to medical student, until an automobile accident in 1966 changed his trajectory forever. Suffering from brain damage and partial paralysis, Jan spent the rest of his life trying to come back from Dead Man's Curve. His story is told here in-depth for the first time, based on extensive primary source documentation and supplemented by the stories and memories of Jan's family members, friends, music industry colleagues, and contemporaries. From the birth of rock to the bitter end, Berry's life story is thrilling, humorous, unsettling, and disturbing, yet ultimately uplifting.

Life Inside the Dead Man's Curve

Life Inside the Dead Man's Curve
Author: Kevin McDonald
Publisher: Morgan James Publishing
Total Pages: 345
Release: 2018-02-21
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1683505220

“A warm compassionate story of helicopters in rescue missions” (Igor Sikorsky Jr., aviation historian). Travis County STAR Flight, in Austin, Texas, is recognized as one of the premier public-safety helicopter programs in the United States. Life Inside the Dead Man’s Curve is a firsthand account of the tragedy and triumph witnessed by STAR Flight crews as they respond to a myriad of emergencies, everything from traumatic injuries to rescues―and more. The author, Kevin McDonald, recounts how he turned his passion for flying into an extraordinary career filled with real-life twists and turns that will keep you on the edge of your seat from start to finish. From his early days as a naval aviator, to his twenty years as a STAR Flight pilot, Kevin takes the reader on a powerful, emotional roller coaster ride. Even if you’re not an aviation enthusiast, you need to strap in for this read. This is more than a book about flying helicopters―it’s a book about life, life inside the dead man’s curve. “A delightful, informative homage to a life of flight.” —Kirkus Reviews

The Mystery of Dead Man's Curve

The Mystery of Dead Man's Curve
Author: Laura E. Williams
Publisher: Scholastic Paperbacks
Total Pages: 117
Release: 2002-03-01
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 9780439217255

After a guest at their aunt's Mystic Lighthouse Bed and Breakfast dies in an accident, twins Jen and Zeke investigate the situation and become very concerned when it appears that someone is trying to scare away the other guests.

Dead Man's Curve and Back

Dead Man's Curve and Back
Author: Mark Thomas Passmore
Publisher:
Total Pages: 328
Release: 2003-10
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9781410756473

Mossy is a tree from the Siskiou forest in Oregon. It is a tree, or is it, or is he? Mossy has red roots that he can pull up out of the ground to run around. He feels and knows what is happening, without eyes, ears or mouth. He gets into all kinds of predicaments with the children and becomes a hero.

The Jan & Dean Record

The Jan & Dean Record
Author: Mark A. Moore
Publisher: McFarland
Total Pages: 463
Release: 2016-03-14
Genre: Music
ISBN: 1476622906

Jan & Dean were among the most successful artists of the late 1950s through the mid-1960s, with hits including "Baby Talk," "Surf City," "Dead Man's Curve" and "The Little Old Lady (From Pasadena)." Slapstick humor and offbeat personas were a big part of their shtick, but Jan Berry was serious when it came to the studio. This book chronicles Jan's career as a songwriter and arranger--and his tenure as producer for Jan & Dean and other acts--with day-by-day entries detailing recording sessions, single and album releases, concerts and appearances, film and television projects, behind-the-scenes business and legal matters, chart positions and more. Extensive commentary from Berry's family, friends and colleagues is included. Studio invoices, contract details, tape box notes, copyright information and other particulars shed light on how music was made in the Hollywood studio system of the 1960s.

The Deadman's Curve

The Deadman's Curve
Author: Tavorris Robinson
Publisher: iUniverse
Total Pages: 225
Release: 2011-08-19
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1462043399

In the gritty streets of Cleveland anything can happen. Just ask Christopher Bird Clark. Being a young hustler raised in the streets, hed seen it all and done it all; TWICE. Growing up under legends like Big Tyco and Flex taught him every facet of the game, enabling him to perfect the concrete hustle and outlast his peers. Shady women, thirsty police and deadly consequences all came with the luxuries the grind afforded. Those would be the evils that he lived with, until the demands of fatherhood prompt him to finally call it quits. But not before leaving an indelible mark on the game; attempting to make his largest play ever and exit before his world crumbles around him. Racing through life in the fast lane rarely allows a sudden exit and the game knows no exception, which he soon realizes as he finds himself struggling to survive, The Deadmans Curve.

Hollywood Eden

Hollywood Eden
Author: Joel Selvin
Publisher: House of Anansi
Total Pages: 309
Release: 2021-04-06
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1487007221

“Hollywood Eden brings the lost humanity of the record business vividly back to life ... [Selvin’s] style is blunt, unpretentious and brisk; he knows how to move things along entertainingly ... Songs about surfboards and convertibles had turned quaint, but in this book, their coolness is restored.” — New York Times From surf music to hot-rod records to the sunny pop of the Beach Boys, Jan & Dean, the Byrds, and the Mama’s & the Papa’s, Hollywood Eden captures the fresh blossom of a young generation who came together in the epic spring of the 1960s to invent the myth of the California Paradise. Central to the story is a group of sun-kissed teens from the University High School class of 1959 — a class that included Jan & Dean, Nancy Sinatra, and future members of the Beach Boys — who came of age in Los Angeles at the dawn of a new golden era when anything seemed possible. These were the people who invented the idea of modern California for the rest of the world. But their own private struggles belied the paradise portrayed in their music. What began as a light-hearted frolic under sunny skies ended up crashing down to earth just a few short but action-packed years later as, one by one, each met their destinies head-on. A rock ’n’ roll opera loaded with violence, deceit, intrigue, low comedy, and high drama, Hollywood Eden tells the story of a group of young artists and musicians who bumped heads, crashed cars, and ultimately flew too close to the sun.

Demon Theory

Demon Theory
Author: Stephen Graham Jones
Publisher: MP Publishing
Total Pages: 461
Release: 2010-05-22
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1596929782

When med student Hale is called home by his ailing mother on Halloween night, he and a group of friends are trapped in an inescapable cycle of violence.

Surf City

Surf City
Author: Dean Torrence
Publisher: SelectBooks, Inc.
Total Pages: 174
Release: 2016-09-13
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1590794036

The Jan and Dean Story is a personal story of the iconic musician and entrepreneur Dean Torrence. As a memoir The Jan and Dean Story has elements of humor, tragedy and redemption. It tells their story from the early high school friendship struck up between Jan Berry and Dean Torrence and their ascent to the dizzying heights of stardom riding the crest of the “surf” craze. The Jan and Dean Story is as much about the culture of the 1960s as it is about music. Dean has lived an incredible life and continues to promote a lifestyle and surf culture that is now universally admired and followed throughout the world. The story also recounts Jan’s tragic car accident and his ability to recover enough to continue to perform will be inspiring to many readers even those not familiar with surf music. For pop culture addicts and music buffs alike this book is indispensable. As early teen icons, Jan and Dean left an indelible mark on the music of the 60’s and the American psyche. Dean Torrence is still touring and creating music and often appears with the Beach Boys and other groups from the heyday of surf music.

Disappearance at Devil's Rock

Disappearance at Devil's Rock
Author: Paul Tremblay
Publisher: HarperCollins
Total Pages: 304
Release: 2016-06-21
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 006236328X

From Paul Tremblay, the author of A Head Full of Ghosts, comes a contemporary psychological suspense concerning a family shaken to its core after the mysterious disappearance of a teenage boy. “A Head Full of Ghosts scared the living hell out of me, and I’m pretty hard to scare,” raved Stephen King about Paul Tremblay’s previous novel. Now, Tremblay returns with another disturbing tale sure to unsettle readers. Late one summer night, Elizabeth Sanderson receives the devastating news that every mother fears: her thirteen-year-old son, Tommy, has vanished without a trace in the woods of a local park. The search isn’t yielding any answers, and Elizabeth and her young daughter, Kate, struggle to comprehend Tommy’s disappearance. Feeling helpless and alone, their sorrow is compounded by anger and frustration: the local and state police have uncovered no leads. Josh and Luis, the friends who were the last to see Tommy before he vanished, may not be telling the whole truth about that night in Borderland State Park, when they were supposedly hanging out a landmark the local teens have renamed Devil’s Rock. Living in an all-too-real nightmare, riddled with worry, pain, and guilt, Elizabeth is wholly unprepared for the strange series of events that follow. She believes a ghostly shadow of Tommy materializes in her bedroom, while Kate and other local residents claim to see a shadow peering through their windows in the dead of night. Then, random pages torn from Tommy’s journal begin to mysteriously appear—entries that reveal an introverted teenager obsessed with the phantasmagoric; the loss of his father, killed in a drunk-driving accident a decade earlier; a folktale involving the devil and the woods of Borderland; and a horrific incident that Tommy believed connects them. As the search grows more desperate, and the implications of what happened become more haunting and sinister, no one is prepared for the shocking truth about that night and Tommy’s disappearance at Devil’s Rock.