Rating: 
Summary: What every PR person should know....
Review: Tye's book is a must-read for any self-respecting PR wizard. How Bernays was able to engineer PR strategies for such diverse products as books and bananas, from Mack trucks to Lucky Strikes and even foreign countries, is ingenious and artful. His creativity hath no bounds. He elevated the practice to a social science, and build roads for the profession. He drafted a historical argument, outlining 5 stages of PR history in America, the last stage being the most interesting to me. This was the "Period of Mutual Understanding," quote: "a time when PR came to mean 'not a one-way street for giving information to the public for our clients but rather one of interpreting the public to the client as a basis for their action and, after the action had been carried out, interpreting the client to the public.'" If only all of us could be so articulate with our clients! Entertaining accounts on how he performed the craft (i.e., selling books by selling builders on the inclusion of book shelves in new homes)and his allegiance to "Big Think," were my favorate parts and I could not hear enough about them. The book explores the complex, contradictory nature he possessed and a surprise revelation in the end (and at the end of Bernay's life), will have you spellbound in disbelief.
Rating: 
Summary: A lot of detail, little insight.
Review: While the first few chapters of the book are entertaining and informatative, the remaining chapters seem to merely add detail to what was already said. Because the book is not structured chronologically, you are forced to jump back and forth through some 75 years worth of events. In some cases, this forces you to revisit the same events in several different chapters. This makes it very difficult to place events in context. Also, the chapters didn't seem to carry equal weight. The book is very well researched and reported. However, it tries too hard to be objective. For every positive thing that the author says about Bernays, there is a negative thing to counter it. After completing the book, I am left with no opinion about the man and I'm unsure of what exactly he did accomplish.
Rating:
Summary: Must reading for students of US history
Review: You can't possibly understand the history of the 20th century without coming to grips with Edward Bernays. Bernays bragged in his autobiography that Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels valued his book "Crystalizing Public Opinion" above all others in his library. Bernays, a relative of Sigmund Freud, applied his formidable intellect to corporate-sponsored tasks such as convincing women to smoke and demonizing movements for land reform in the Third World. Sadly, this thoroughly amoral individual's outlook on life - bend the truth for the highest bidder regardless of who is harmed - has become the norm, not the exception, among "communications" professionals who apply their craft with a charm and polish that belies the often deadly consequences of their "campaigns."
Rating: 
Summary: A great read!
Review: You've seen Wag the Dog and Primary Colors, you've watched politicians talk out of both sides of their mouths, you've seen the President get into trouble only to have the spin doctors bail him out. Ever wonder where it all started? This book is what you new to read to find out. Larry Tye gives you the reader an in depth look at Edward Bernay's and the birth of public relation or the beginnings of spin. From Bernay's start in the 1920's to his revolutionary ideas of parading women down the streets of New York to promote smoking you'll get a fist hand look at how spin works. Read through the 260 plus pages and see why we use spin, how public relations can and does affect public opinion. Watch and learn from the father or master of the public relations. Larry Tye has a well researched and extremely detail account of the beginnings. Fascinated and educated are the two words to describe what I walked away from this book with. Fascination about Bernay's ability to make things come out his way and sway the public to follow, educated has to how spin control works in today's culture. A great read for all!
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