Book Recommendations

Does anyone have any good Las Vegas-themed book recommendations?

 

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is the quintessential Vegas trip report...

 

Lets not limit ourselves.

Riding Rockets- Space Shuttle Astronauts.

great book with lots of adventure.

 

Any of these are good...

 

Under the Neon Sky is pretty good, mostly sad, but good.
A fascinating and entertaining tale of sheer gamblin', Amarillo Slim In A World Full of Fat People.
No Limit, about Bob Stupak & Blood Aces about Benny Binion are pretty interesting reads as well.

 

Though not set in Vegas you might like Casino Royale by Ian Fleming. The first of his James Bond books. The first paragraph...

"The scent and smoke and sweat of a casino are nauseating at three in the morning. Then the soul-erosion produced by high gambling - a compost of fear and greed and nervous tension - becomes unbearable and the senses awake and revolt from it."

 

If you like gritty crime, James Ellroy's Underworld USA Trilogy takes place between Las Vegas (Howard Hughes-"the Drac"), Miami, Cuba, Vietnam, Los Angels, The DR and Haiti and other random spots; the characters and their actions are despicable,racist, misogynistic, and often worse, truly the underbelly of corrupt folks, not meant to glorify them though, many get what is coming to them; just so well written and complex, just be prepared. Classify these as "Historical-Crime-Conspiracy-theory" Fiction

American Tabloid
Cold Six-thousand
Blood's a Rover

A few cross-over characters from his LA Quartet series (Big Nowhere, Black Dahlia, LA Confidential (yes the basis for, the movie), White Jazz). Now with 2 prequels, Perfidia and This Storm.

(if you can't tell, I love this author!)

 

Private Vegas by James Patterson

 

Thanks, everyone! Great suggestions!

 

It's curious, the Dean Koontz book that people claim "predicted" this virus we're all dealing with now, The Eyes of Darkness, starts out set in Las Vegas. I ordered it from our closed storage library because of the hubbub. I enjoyed the Vegas bits. I never got to finish it as we needed to digitize it since there was such a rabid demand for it and it seems to be out of print. It's a page turner for sure, dunno how it ends.

Another good "gambling" book (not Vegas, Biloxi) I came across and did not finish is called "Bob the Gambler" (not the movie, although the book briefly mentions the movie) by Frederick Barthelem. Quiet good, not sure why I returned it other than I thought I had forever and a day to read it. Now the library is closed so I have to wait and wait to find out what happens. Finish your books people! You may not have another chance!

And, as always when this subject comes up, I recommend "Check-raising the Devil" by Mike the Mouth Matusow, and "One of a Kind: The Rise and Fall of Stuey "The Kid" Ungar, Poker's Greatest Player." The Stuey book is so good.

 

I like the books James Swain has written about an ex-cop turned casino security consult. Grift Sense is the name of the 1st one in the series. Not exactly high brow or really well written. However they are a quick fun read and the focus is casinos and scams.

He has another few books called The Billy Cunningham series. These are stories told from the “other “ side, from the con men. Same type of writing, fun and easy read.

 

The Madness of March- the book is about the first 4 days of the NCAA tournament in 2007. Some very funny stories

 

Vintage Las Vegas by Papa

 

Positively Fifth Street: Murderers, Cheetahs, and Binion's World Series of Poker, by James McManus