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A Night of Bridge, a Fatal Hand, and a New American Age
by Gary M. Pomerantz
As the Roaring Twenties' last celebratory peals rang through a nation about to slip into the Depression, Myrtle Bennett, a glamorous Kansas City housewife, killed her philandering husband over a bridge game. At her ballyhooed murder trial, her defense attorney was a two-time Democratic presidential candidate and Pendergast Machine–man, James A. Reed. Merely the most famous man in Kansas City, Reed, a riveting orator, represented the likes of Henry Ford and oil companies. For Myrtle, he put on a dramatic courtroom show of logic, eloquence, and a few tears. Watching from New York was Ely Culbertson, a tuxedoed boulevardier with a Russian accent and a gorgeous American wife, Josephine, who was his bridge partner. As the P.T. Barnum of the game of bridge, Ely Culbertson offered trial commentary and used the Bennetts' story to sell bridge, his instructional books, and himself. Housewives adored him and rushed to hear his lectures. A few months after the 1931 trial, when the Culbertsons won the Bridge Battle of the Century at the Waldorf-Astoria amid the glitter of New York’s high society and Hollywood newsreels, they became millionaire icons.
Through these larger-than-life characters and the timeless partnership game they played, The Devil's Tickets evokes the last echoes of the Gay '20s and the darkness of the Depression. Ultimately it reveals a tension between husbands and wives that is eternal and that manifests itself at the bridge table—both then and now—in ways surprising and profound.
"The author capably records the fading echoes of all the gaiety and gunfire, but he tends to attribute more cultural consequence to these events than they merit. " - Kirkus Reviews
"Pomerantz offers a thoroughly researched historical tapestry with a mass of amusing anecdotes. But toward the book's end, he swerves into his own fascination with Myrtle Bennett as leading to his historical inquiry into these events." - Publishers Weekly
"Bridge and murder, two of mankind's most engrossing pursuits – in The Devil’s Tickets Gary Pomerantz intermingles both to create a crackling portrait of a vibrant past age and a singular moment when a bullet trumped all." - Erik Larson, author of the New York Times bestseller The Devil in the White City.
"A great story, a real drama, a perfect window on American culture – and best of all, beautifully written with the lightest touch." - Susan Orlean,author of the New York Times bestseller The Orchid Thief
"Masterfully reported, beautifully written, and all but impossible to put down." - Jonathan Eig, author of the New York Times bestseller Luckiest Man
“Nowadays people tend to think of the game of bridge as old and somewhat fuddy-duddy, but once upon a time it was young and sexy. What a delight to read Gary M. Pomerantz’s engaging account of how all this got started.”
—Louis Sachar,author of the National Book Award winning Holes
This information about The Devil's Tickets was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Gary M Pomerantz is an author and journalist and serves as a visiting lecturer in the Department of Communication at Stanford University. His first book, Where Peachtree Meets Sweet Auburn, was named a 1996 Notable Book of the Year by the New York Times. He also earned acclaim for Nine Minutes, Twenty Seconds and Wilt, 1962. A graduate of the University of California, Berkeley, Pomerantz lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife and their three children.
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