C O N T E N T S

My Favorite Flick
By Don George, Editor

Las Vegas
By Cynthia Gorney
- Books on Las Vegas
- Getting there

D E P A R T M E N T S

Postmark: Bangkok
By Steve Van Beek

Passages:
"Under the Tuscan Sun"
By Frances Mayes
- Books on Tuscany
- Getting there

Table Talk
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and Tales

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               B O O K S  O N   L A S   V E G A S

FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS

BY HUNTER S. THOMPSON | a doctor of gonzo journalism, under the assumed identity of Raoul Duke, and his attorney head to Las Vegas in a rented, cherry red convertible with the goal of finding the American Dream. They bring a lot of drugs: "two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, and a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers ... and also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of Budweiser, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls," to be exact. And what they do in the following 200 pages is enough to make the city of crime, corruption, greed and sex appear downright virginal. Published by Rolling Stone in 1971, this book became an instant classic of its time. It not only provided the "coming out" ball for a thriving drug culture, but it introduced a revolutionary style and theory of journalism. Thompson brings us a Las Vegas that few have the daring -- or narcotics supply -- to see for themselves.

LITERARY LAS VEGAS

EDITED BY MIKE TRONNES | las Vegas is, as Nick Tosches explains in the introduction to this anthology, "truly, majestically mediocre ... a land of chrome, not gold; of Armstrong linoleum, not Carrara marble." Las Vegas as city, as concept, lies at the heart of the American Dream after it's fallen into bed with greed: the promise that anyone can be rich and belong to the upper class, mingled with a get-rich-quick mentality and smothered in second-rate tackiness. That volatile mix has inspired writers, famous and not, for decades, and many of their reflections are captured in this charming anthology. This collection includes must-reads by Tom Wolfe, Hunter Thompson, Joan Didion, John Gregory Dunne and Noel Coward -- most reprinted from magazine articles written during the past 30 years, when Vegas was past its heyday and riding the residual momentum into its prime.

THE CHEAPSKATE'S GUIDE TO LAS VEGAS