Cheat and Charmer

by Elizabeth Frank

Book Overview

Twenty-five years in the making, a first novel that has already been compared to The Sun Also Rises and The Last Tycoon, Cheat and Charmer is certain to be one of the most admired literary debuts of... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1400060915
• ISBN13: 9781400060917
• Release Date: October 2004
• Publisher: Random House (NY)
• Length: 543 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.5" x 6.6" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

Inside Hollywood's Blacklist Outing Moment Brilliantly Captured

That Elizabeth Frank is screenwriter-novleist is more than evident in this sumptuous period piece on 1950's Hollywood's in its darkest hour. With vivid, crystalline detail, Frank ushers us right inside the hallowed inner circles of Hollywood's elite as they cope with the consequences of the poison-pen ethos of McCarthyist Washington, parrying its wrath in order to keep their careers, dignity, families and homes intact and move forward with their lives. Frank's snappy storytelling doesn't miss a beat as she jet-sets us from the deal-making pool parties of Southern California, to hedonistic ex-pats basking in sunny Southern France, to the rehearsal halls of New York and back again, all while shattering the glass house inhabited by Dinah and Jake Lasker en famille, and others, with consummate skill. Cheat and Charmer's best enjoyed on the beach or on the porch where you can savor every nostalgic detail of life in the fifties and feel completely transported to another time and place. This one deserves an encore!

Engrossing

This is possibly the best book I've read in many years. It carried me into the lives of Dinah and Jake to the point that I felt like I was living with them and feeling their laughter and pain. Elizabeth Frank may well be one of the best writers of our time. Although it took place in the 50' it is truly a timeless work of art. Bravo and Encore!!!

Intelligent Fiction

with deeply nuanced characters who are not espcially likeable. The thing I loved about this book is that there are no easy answers. All of these characters make choices that have long reaching results. If you believe that ethics are situational; that choices are neither morally good or bad (in and of themselves), this book will make you pause. The author does an outstanding job of showing the emotional consequences of seemingly simple choices. The history of LA in the 50s (I lived it), the blacklist and the movie business all ring true. This is one of the best books I have read this year. I literally read it in a 24 hour period and was sad to see it end.

Screwball, Satire and Tragedy

This book is both hilarious, moving, sad and satirical. Elizabeth Frank is an amazing story teller like the early Phillip Roth and sometimes like IB Singer. The characters in this book are conflicted, ambitious eccentric citizens of Hollywood. Who new that such complexity lies in the hearts and minds of the residents of Beverly Hills. The blacklist of 1950s America turns the life of this particular family, the Laskers, into chaos. The characters are fully alive with humor and broken hearts. The philandering husband, Jake can't resist sexual liasons and pastrami sandwiches in the middle of the night. Their kids Lorna and Peter remind me of Scout and Gem in 'To Kill a Mocking Bird' learning all about growing up, not among the poor and opressed, but among loneliness, neglect and the painful criticism of grown-ups. They have no Atticus Finch. But they have an amazing and imperfect mother, Dinah, who does testify before the HUAC to save her family while she is still able to demonstrate tremendous integrity in life. Dinah's rivalry with her gorgeous sister, Veevee grows more complicated and divisive as bothwomen grow older looking back at the folly of their former political involvement with 'The Party.' There are other great charcters and details in this book that one can only know as a reader. It is a beautifully observed story of a certain time and place. AM Weiss

Magnificently engrossing novel, finest kind

Entirely involving, entertaining and nuanced (that's the new adjective, right?) novel about Hollywood (woo-hoo) during the HUAC witchhunt. Some might call this book a soap-opera but, would that be so bad? Most everything the revered Faulkner wrote is not only soap opera but, gasp, Southern Gothic Soap Opera. LOVED this book which brings back to public consciousness a black period for the U.S. and for democracy and discusses it with a grey palette. Wonderful, exquisite, consuming reading. Well written, with very knowing eye and irony; it's a DO-NOT-MISS-BOOK!