return to home  
Join   |  Gift   |  Member Login   |  Library Login
BookBrowse Mobile
Follow Us: 
   Summary and Book Reviews

American Dream Machine: Summary and book reviews of American Dream Machine by Matthew Specktor, plus links to an excerpt from American Dream Machine and a biography of Matthew Specktor.

American Dream Machine

American Dream Machine
by Matthew Specktor
Hardcover: Apr 2013,
464 pages.

Publication information
Author Information
Critics' Opinion:   
Readers' Rating:    Not Yet Rated
About BookBrowse Rankings
Share: 
Buy This Book

BOOK SUMMARY

American Dream Machine is the story of two talent agents and their three troubled boys, heirs to Hollywood royalty. It's a sweeping narrative about fathers and sons, the movie business, and the sundry sea changes that have shaped Hollywood and, by extension, American life.

Beau Rosenwald, overweight, not particularly handsome, and improbably charismatic, arrives in Los Angles in 1962 with nothing but an ill-fitting suit and a pair of expensive brogues. By the late 1970s he has helped found the most successful agency in Hollywood. Through the eyes of his son, we watch Beau and his partner go to war, waging a seismic battle that redraws the lines of an entire industry.

We watch Beau rise and fall and rise again, in accordance with the cultural transformations that dictate the fickle world of movies. We watch Beau's partner, the enigmatic and cerebral Williams Farquarsen, struggle to contain himself, to control his impulses and consolidate his power. And we watch two generations of men fumble and thrive across the LA landscape, learning for themselves the shadows and costs exacted by success and failure.

Mammalian, funny, and filled with characters both vital and profound, American Dream Machine is a piercing interrogation of the role, nourishing, as well as destructive, that illusion plays in all our lives.
BookBrowse

American Dream Machine beautifully illustrates not just how the sun is setting on the myth of self-made individualism but also how, with their feet planted on unsteady ground, the young now have no guaranteed formulas for success. "Life was more like the movies than anyone cared to admit. It was predicated on them, far more than vice versa," Nate says. Fair enough. Except, as he very well knows, not all movies have fairytale endings.  (Reviewed by Poornima Apte).

Full Review Members Only (986 words).

Media Reviews

  LA Review of Books
American Dream Machine is written with a great ear for a sentence and a funny line ("You think it's easier to sell actors than shoes?"). More importantly, it evokes a world with casual ease and unexpected tenderness, recalling and referencing lots of other fiction (both Hollywood and non) while contriving to establish its own unique authority.

  Publishers Weekly
While Specktor, a film executive and the founding editor of the Los Angeles Review of Books, does not quite achieve an epic tone, his novel of the seedy guardians of the mythic American dream succeeds in showing just how unpleasant the film industry can be.

  The Telegraph (UK)
Specktor’s great achievement is to make familiar territory original, the Hollywood novel born anew. It’s bold, weird and unforgettable, as startling as a poke in the eye.

Author Blurb Victor LaValle, author of Big Machine and The Devil in Silver
American Dream Machine is grand, complex, lush, intelligent and lively, funny as hell and generous in ways you don’t often find. It’s also a strikingly original portrait of Los Angeles.

Recent Reader Reviews

Acting Talent Agencies

A talent agency is an organization that represents talent – actors, musicians, writers etc – and pitches their clients' talents to appropriate organizations. For example, a Hollywood talent agency will pitch or plug a particular actor on roles for upcoming movie projects. Talent agencies work closely with production companies and casting directors. In Hollywood, talent agents are certified by the Screen Actors Guild and follow certain professional rules of conduct. This includes the setting of fees. Most talent agents will take 10% of an actor's earnings from a role. The talent agent helps in pitching the actor and procuring auditions although the final results are dependent on the actor alone.

Angelina JolieWhile talent agencies in Hollywood have been around since the 1930s, their role was somewhat limited as lead actors were usually under exclusive contract to an individual studio. But by...

Continued...  Beyond the Book (members only)

Readalikes Full readalike results are for members only

If you liked American Dream Machine, try these:


A Visit from the Goon Squad
by Jennifer Egan

A Visit from the Goon Squad is a book about the interplay of time and music, about survival, about the stirrings and transformations set inexorably in motion by even the most passing conjunction of our fates. Sly, startling, exhilarating work from one of our boldest writers.

City of the Sun
by David Levien

Riveting suspense in the tradition of Dennis Lehane and Michael Connelly, City of the Sun introduces retired detective Frank Behr—an imposing, charismatic former cop who agrees to take the case of a boy who’s been missing for over a year.


These are 2 of the 4 readalike suggestions for American Dream Machine. Members have full access to all readalikes. If you are a member, please login. To find out more about membership, click here.


Become a Member
Click Here
Editor's Choice
  •  Jun 19 
  •  Jun 17 
  •  Jun 15 
If You Find Me
Emily Murdoch

If You Find Me Jacket

There are some things you can't leave behind…
Americanah
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Americanah Jacket

Fearless, gripping, at once darkly funny and tender, spanning three continents and numerous lives, Americanah is a richly told story set in today's globalized world.
We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves
Karen Joy Fowler

We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves Jacket

The story of an American family, middle class in middle America, ordinary in every way but one. But that exception is the beating heart of this extraordinary novel.
The Expats by Chris Pavone
   Most Recent Blog Entries
Top Ten Guidelines For How to Behave in a Book Club
Movies Based on Books: Summer 2013 (May - August)
Jewish Themed Young Adult Books, Not About The Holocaust
rss  RSS   rss  subscribe
Recent Reader Reviews
In the Shadow of the Banyan by Vaddey Ratner
First time novelist Vaddey Ratner captured my heart and senses in this novel based on her childhood in Cambodia. Her story transcends any news story... read more
In the Shadow of the Banyan by Vaddey Ratner
From the first page, I was drawn in by the lyrical writing of the author and mesmerized as the narrator, eight year old Raami, remembered the years... read more
TransAtlantic by Colum McCann
Trite but true, all good things must come to an end. I so wanted to keep reading the wonderful prose, the settings that let one think they are part... read more
RSS RSS feed More...  
Most Viewed This Week
1. Coraline
Neil Gaiman
2. Memoirs of a Geisha
Arthur Golden
3. The Glass Castle
Jeannette Walls
4. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Rebecca Skloot
5. Behind the Beautiful Forevers
Katherine Boo
More...
Book Club Recommendations
Where'd You Go, Bernadette
by Maria Semple
Paperback (Apr/13)
The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry
by Rachel Joyce
Paperback (Mar/13)
The Unchangeable Spots of Leopards
by Kristopher Jansma
Hardback (Mar/13)
How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia
by Mohsin Hamid
Hardback (Mar/13)
More...
First Impressions
Members read and review books often months before they're published. See what they think in First Impressions!
Children of the Jacaranda Tree
by Sahar Delijani
4.5 Stars            (Jun/13)
Her Last Breath
by Linda Castillo
4.5 Stars            (Jun/13)
Crime of Privilege
by Walter Walker
Four Stars            (Jun/13)
More...
  Latest BookBrowse News
Kenn Nesbitt is new Children's Poet Laureate (Jun 12 2013)
Kenn Nesbitt has been named the new Children's Poet Laureate: Consultant in Children's Poetry to the Poetry Foundation, which noted that the two-year position... Full Story
rss RSS feed More...
 
BookBrowse Poll
Q: We've been discussing guidelines for book club etiquette. Which of these do you think are important?
Read the book
Listen thoughtfully to all members
Take notes while you're reading
Stay on topic when you're speaking
Enjoy yourself
Don’t get drunk
Bring chocolate, everyone likes chocolate!
Eat before you come so you don’t devour the snacks
Compliment others sincerely
Have a good sense of humor
Don’t fret the small stuff
Search: Title or Author
Free Newsletters

Online Book Club
More about
The Execution of Noa P. Singleton
Join the discussion!


Win This Book!
You Only Get Letters From Jail


one of the finest and truest collections of 'American' short stories I have ever read

Enter To Win Now!

wordplay
Solve this clue:
"T M T C, T M T Stay T S"

and be entered
to win....
frame top
New Author
Interviews
Carol Rifka Brunt
Kent Wascom
Jennifer McVeigh
Elizabeth Becker
frame bottom
HOME Book Submissions | Advertising | Library Subscriptions | Reviewing for BookBrowse | Contact Us