An industry professional's insider's look at the craft, practice, and business of screenwriting, exploding some of the most popular myths about writing for the movies by showing how little relevance they have to actual working conditions. Analytical essays stand side by side with not only the author's own in-the-field experiences, but commentary offered by veteran industry pros including Josh Sapan, CEO of AMC Networks; bestselling author and writer/director Adriana Trigiani; and Oscar-nominated screenwriter Nicholas (Goodfellas) Pileggi.

There are two ages in the history of television: before HBO and after HBO. Before the launch of Home Box Office in 1972, the industry had changed little since the birth of broadcast network television in the late 1940s. The arrival of the premium cable channel began a revolution in the business and programming of TV. For the generation that has grown up with the vast array of viewing choices available today, it is almost inconceivable that our ever-expanding media universe began with a few hours of unimpressive programming on a single cable channel. This is the story of HBO's reconfiguration of television and the company's continual reinvention of itself in a competitive and dynamic industry.

At his peak, from the late 1960s through the early 1970s, Sam Peckinpah was hailed as one of the new masters of the Western film, while simultaneously becoming one of the most controversial American directors of the era. In a time of great social turmoil, Peckinpah's on-screen orchestration of physical and emotional violence drew adamant praise for what some considered fearless realism and vehement criticism for what others called tasteless gore and brutal misogyny. Debate over the violence and sexual themes of Peckinpah's films often eclipsed aesthetic appreciation of his work. A favorite target of 1970s feminist critics, feminist social debate, combined with the director's own combative persona usually prevented reasoned evaluation of his films. A prevalent auteurist view did not recognize how Peckinpah was subject to the whims and character of an industry in which he rarely navigated successfully. While the passage of time has muted the initial shock value of his filmed violence, no similar reappraisal has ever dealt with those initial misperceptions of misogyny, and looked to reevaluate his on-screen treatment of women. Peckinpah's Women examines the confluence of factors that worked with, and often against, Peckinpah's cinematic voice to divine a recurring positive theme regarding women in those films that form the heart of his body of work: his period Westerns.

From across the spectrum of the arts-theater to music, painting to poetry, and everything in between-men and women from the creative front lines share their experiences and insights on the often harsh realities of a life in the arts. Artists on the Art of Survival examines the lives of artists as some continue to struggle to find their place, others have managed to carve out a niche for themselves, and still others have, for a variety of reasons, moved on to something else. By exploring each of these paths of development, the book provides valuable, practical, and spiritual lessons in maintaining and surviving as a working artist.

One of the most controversial films of its time, The Wild Bunch is the epitome of the no-holds-barred filmmaking of the 1960s and 1970s. Since its 1969 release, it has come to be recognized not only as an iconic Western, but as one of the most important films in the American cinematic canon. Over the years a parade of filmmakers have tried to imitate its gut-punch effects but none have equaled it. The Wild Bunch revived the floundering career of volatile, self-destructive director Sam Peckinpah-it also hung on him the label him "Bloody Sam." This book tells the complete story of the film's production, reception and legacy.

Big Hug is a beautifully told story for children everywhere. It's Li'l Fox's first day of daycare and she is scared. New place. New friends. New worries. After her mom wraps her in a big hug and leaves her to go to work, Li'l Fox seeks comfort from her new classmates through friendly hugs. But after she is rejected on multiple accounts, Li'l Fox must learn that if she wants to make a new friend she must first remember to be brave.

There is cinema . . . and there are the movies. This is a book for movie junkies: salutes to the once great but now forgotten stars, to the acknowledged behind-the-scenes movers and shakers, and to the movies themselves-the classics major and minor, the overlooked gems, the guiltiest of guilty pleasures. If you're old enough to remember Saturday matinees or late night fright flicks on your local TV channels-or just wish you were-grab a bag of popcorn, a soft seat, and enjoy the show. This book synopsizes dozens of films, and includes a variety of personal and critical essays written by Bill Mesce, Jr.

"The only place in the world that has more information about movies than Bill Mesce is Google, and when Google is stuck, it calls Bill. He loves and understands them: the classics, the disasters, where they have been and where they are headed. He is an incredible writer and takes you into them in a way that opens new understanding of why they are the way they are and how they got that way. The next best thing to going to the movies is to read what Bill Mesce has to say about them." Bill Persky, Five-time Emmy Award-winning writer and director The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Bill Cosby Special, Kate & Allie, and creator of That Girl. "Smart, insightful and often funny, Bill Mesce 's essays are the best reminder I can find in print of why I love movies. Whether one knows the films he writes about well or just a bit, it's a joy to have Bill take you into his world of movies." Josh Sapan, CEO and President, AMC Networks "If you want the hidden story of the men and women who made Hollywood what it is today, the good the bad and the ugly, from an unconventional savant, then Bill Mesce's tour is the book for you." Jeff Bewkes, Chairman and CEO, Time Warner "Bill Mesce's Reel Change is a book that any filmgoer, film lover, or film historian should read. It is full of smart and witty anecdotes and insightful historical commentary about the personal and emotional relationships to the magical and transformative experience that is watching movies." Andrew Goldman VP, HBO/Cinemax Program Planning and Scheduling

Award-winning novelist, screenwriter and playwright Bill Mesce, Jr. turns, for the first time, to short fiction in a gallery of pieces ranging from the familiar (an encounter at a winter-whipped commuter bus stop in "North") to the arcane (a lost cavalry patrol in the Civil War-set "Precis"); the sweet (a hopeful tete a tete at Parisian cafe in "Ad Vivum") to the bittersweet (a drifter marking time between busses in "Ante Meridiem"); the intimate (an altar boy's private rebellion in "Crusade") to the epic (the Vietnam War novella, "Diamond Red." Mesce's stunning first collection of short fiction grafts sharp images onto a landscape filled with compelling characters, characters who laugh and love and ache. His stories carry and a sense of immediacy, the truth of experience.

The work examines the evolution of the thriller from the heyday of the Hollywood mogul era in the 1930s when it was primarily bottom-of-the-bill fodder, through its maturity in the World War II years and noir-breeding 1950s, its commercial and critical ascendancy in the 1960s and 1970s, and finally its subsequent box office dominance in the age of the blockbuster.