Rating: 
Summary: The growth of gossip provides entertainment
Review: Not as lightweight as the title would have you believe, this overview of the growth of celebrity gossip is fascinating. The author chronicles the events which took gossip from a limited group of tabloids to the pages of some of the world's most prestigious newspapers as well as the surprising successful efforts of celebrities to control their public image.
Rating: 
Summary: Tasting Menu? Yes. Dish? Naww...
Review: The author is too enamored of the world she writes about to provide much meaningful critique. She gets to the brink of saying that someone like Liz Smith is a mere PR puppet, or that the venerable PR firm PMK manipulates and controls the media, but she stops short for fear of biting the leathery hands that presumably feed her. Honey, you just can't have it both ways. There's something very early '90s about Walls. She needs a new persona, and a more thoughtful, detached one might not be all bad. But first she has to get tough on herself and curtail her own tendency to venerate the very celebrities and media figures she also seems to want to skewer. She claims to dislike celebs, but no one's buying it. Ditto the machinations of the pr and media worlds. She loves it! If she sticks to book publishing, there may well be a place at the grownups' table for her. But to succeed, she needs to go out on some sort of limb, and not expect the reader -- who comes to the dinner party expecting some real "DISH" -- to be sated by table scraps and leftovers. If she ever does another book -- and this one shows signs of deadline fatigue and slow torture -- she'd do well to work with an editor on establishing a point of view for herself.
Rating: 
Summary: Tells ABOUT gossip...and includes some! GREAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Review: This book completely EXCEEDED my expectations! As a former journalist (who is now a ventriloquist believe it or not) I've always been interested in how and why gossip has grown in our news media. I got THAT answer in this wonderful book written in a breezy, solid style that made it hard for me to put -- plus a LOT MORE. Starting with Matt Drudge's meteoric rise, DISH backtracks to trace the growth in gossip over the years. You'll also find new revelations in here. In the end our news media (what it printed and NEGLECTED to print over the years) will make sense to you. And it reads like a novel. Some tidbits: 1. The overnight rise of Matt Drudge, using a computer his dad gifted him. Everything you wanted to know and what you didn't want or need to know (i.e. his alleged sexual preferences; media suspicions that he got some scoops through hacking) about him and how his lively internet column took over, confounded mainstream media and made him a huge multi-media star.
2. How the Hollywood studios along with fawning California politicos crushed Confidential magazine, the 1950s gossip sheet which dared to undermine the carefully-constructed phoney public relations images of many stars (some stars are named in the book).
3. Mike Wallace's pioneering role in bringing show biz to news, his fall from grace and professional rebirth on 60 Minutes.
4. The birth of the National Inquirer and why it's located in Florida (fears of problems from the Mob).
5. Why there wasn't more MAJOR NEGATIVE published gossip on the Kennedy administration (they virtually destroyed one person dabbling in info about them and many journalists were intimidated.) JFK's other marriage.
6. The OJ case, Elvis Princess Diana case, the gossip columnists of the 40s and 50s and their replacements, the explanation of why Rona Barrett had such a sudden rise and fall. The birth of People Magazine and it's influence on pushing tabloids to another level...which pushed the national media to a new level (or low?).
7. Hardball-playing p.r. and private detectives who contolled their clients images and staved off major scandals -- and how they do it (bullying, getting the dirt on and confronting critics and making sought after clients inaccessible to offending journalists). This is a highly ENTERTAINING book, with lots of facts, quotes and info that you haven't read elsewhere. It's solidly written but an EASY read and you'll REGRET it when you come to the last page. It answered a LOT of questions for me about what "really" went on and why our news media is the way it is today. SUPERB!!!
| 
