Flickering Empire: How Chicago Invented the U.S. Film Industry

Flickering Empire tells the fascinating yet little-known story of how Chicago served as the unlikely capital of American film production in the years before the rise of Hollywood (1907–1913). As entertaining as it is informative, Flickering Empire straddles the worlds of academic and popular nonfiction in its vivid illustration of the rise and fall of the major Chicago movie studios in the mid-silent era (principally Essanay and Selig Polyscope). Colorful, larger-than-life historical figures, including Thomas Edison, Charlie Chaplin, Oscar Micheaux, and Orson Welles, are major players in the narrative―in addition to important though forgotten industry titans, such as "Colonel" William Selig, George Spoor, and Gilbert "Broncho Billy" Anderson.

Business & Money

Selzer, Adam

Smith, Michael Glover

Industries

Wallflower Press

One of Chicago’s landmark attractions, Graceland Cemetery chronicles the city’s sprawling history through the stories of its people. Local historian and Graceland tour guide Adam Selzer presents ten walking tours covering almost the entirety of the cemetery grounds. While nodding to famous Graceland figures from Marshall Field to Ernie Banks to Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Selzer also leads readers past the vaults, obelisks, and other markers that call attention to less recognized Chicagoans like: Jessie Williams de Priest, the Black wife of a congressman whose 1929 invitation to a White House tea party set off a storm of controversy; Engineer and architect Fazlur Khan, the Bangladeshi American who revived the city's skyscraper culture; The still-mysterious Kate Warn (listed as Warn on her tombstone), the United States’ first female private detective. 
Filled with photographs and including detailed maps of each tour route, Graceland Cemetery is an insider's guide to one of Chicago's great outdoor destinations for city lore and history.

Graceland Cemetery: Chicago Stories, Symbols, and Secrets

History

Americas

3 Fields Books

Extraordinary: The True Story of My Fairy Godparent, Who Almost Killed Me and Certainly Never Made Me a Princess

Delacorte

How to Get Suspended and Influence People

It all starts with an assignment. Leon's "gifted and talented" class has to make educational videos for the sixth and seventh graders. Leon originally chooses "sex ed" as his subject in the hopes of showing a flash of boob. But as time goes on, his project starts to mean something. He wants to tell the younger kids that puberty is tough, but what they're going through is normal. After researching the avant-garde movement, Leon crafts his video in the style of Fellini: La Dolce Pubert. It's deeply disturbing yet comforting. But when the gifted program's director sees it, she suspends Leon—and he finds himself at the center of a townwide debate over censorship. Who gets to decide how far is too far?

Children's Books

Delacorte Books for Young Readers

Pirates of the Retail Wasteland

Leon and his miscreant buddies from the gifted pool are mad as hell, and they’re not going to take it anymore! Their favorite downtown coffeeshop, Sip–the only survivor in the barren moonscape of decrepit Old Downtown–is in danger of being run out of business by the ubiquitous and oh-so-corporate coffee chain, Wackford’s. Wackford’s doesn’t host readings or smell funky or support the arts the way Sip does–it’s basically a glorified office. With the help of the Wackford’s manager–a self-described “McHobo” who’s worked for every chain along the strip–Leon and his friends decide to protest by taking over the Wackford’s and making it into a middle-management office. Meanwhile, Leon deals with an unwanted crush, a Mohawked father, and his friend Dustin’s ongoing quest to take down the gym teacher via depressing poems. Nothing quite goes as expected, but that’s the great thing about life in the gifted pool.

Teen & Young Adult

Literature & Fiction

Delacorte Pr

I Kissed a Zombie, and I Liked It

Algonquin “Ali” Rhodes, the high school newspaper’s music critic, meets an intriguing singer, Doug, while reviewing a gig. He’s a weird-looking guy—goth, but he seems sincere about it, like maybe he was into it back before it was cool. She introduces herself after the set, asking if he lives in Cornersville, and he replies, in his slow, quiet murmur, “Well, I don’t really live there, exactly. . . .” When Ali and Doug start dating, Ali is falling so hard she doesn’t notice a few odd signs: he never changes clothes, his head is a funny shape, and he says practically nothing out loud. Finally Marie, the school paper’s fashion editor, points out the obvious: Doug isn’t just a really sincere goth. He’s a zombie. Horrified that her feelings could have allowed her to overlook such a flaw, Ali breaks up with Doug, but learns that zombies are awfully hard to get rid of—at the same time she learns that vampires, a group as tightly-knit as the mafia, don’t think much of music critics who make fun of vampires in reviews. . . .

I Put a Spell on You: From the Files of Chrissie Woodward, Spelling Bee Detective

COME SPELLING BEE season, the tiny town of Preston erupts in excitement: the bee is televised, and the hottest ticket in town. This year, an assortment of sixth-grade miscreants is going for the top prize: Jennifer, an overscheduled free spirit whose parents are obsessed with her college applications; Mutual, a previously home-schooled outsider who's enrolled in public school for the first time in order to participate in the bee; Harlan, the class clown who has spectacular plans for making the most of his time in the spotlight; and Chrissie, the constant observer, who suspects something is off at the bee and will stop at nothing to get to the truth. Principal Floren is acting shady to everyone—but, as he insists, “I am not a crook.”

Humor

Andrew North Blows Up the World

A dynamic and hilarious new hero for early middle-grade.Andrew "Danger" North is no ordinary third-grader. He, his brother, Jack, and his father are spies. That is what Jack has always told him, and everything Andrew has learned from his dad’s favorite spy movies tells him it must be true. When Andrew comes across his brother’s graphing calculator, he’s sure it’s a communication device that will put him in touch with the secret spy headquarters. But instead of punching in a greeting to the spy society, Andrew accidentally punches in a code that might blow up the world! And if that isn’t bad enough, his math teacher then confiscates the top secret communication device and takes it to the mysterious Storage Room B. Now Andrew is on a spy mission to find his brother’s communicator and save the world from mass destruction. Will he be able to save the world?

Action & Adventure

Jennifer Van Der Berg would like you to know that the book ostensibly written about her—Born to Be Extraordinary by Eileen Codlin—is a bunch of bunk. Yes, she had a fairy godparent mess with her life, but no, she was not made into a princess or given the gift of self-confidence, and she sure as hell didn't get a hot boyfriend out of it. Here's the REAL scoop . . .

Extraordinary*: *The True Story of My Fairygodparent, Who Almost Killed Me, and Certainly Never Made Me a Princess

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Selzer, Adam. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Selzer, Adam

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Selzer, Adam. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Flickering Empire: How Chicago Invented the U.S. Film Industry

Flickering Empire: How Chicago Invented the U.S. Film Industry

Graceland Cemetery: Chicago Stories, Symbols, and Secrets

Extraordinary: The True Story of My Fairy Godparent, Who Almost Killed Me and Certainly Never Made Me a Princess

How to Get Suspended and Influence People

Pirates of the Retail Wasteland

I Kissed a Zombie, and I Liked It

I Put a Spell on You: From the Files of Chrissie Woodward, Spelling Bee Detective

Andrew North Blows Up the World

Extraordinary: The True Story of My Fairygodparent, Who Almost Killed Me, and Certainly Never Made Me a Princess