Take Charge of Your Financial Future: Straight Talk on Managing Your Money from the Financial Analyst Who Defied Donald Trump - Hardcover

A balanced, if redundant, account of the life and times of rock promoter Bill Graham, by English-born investigative journalist Glatt. Born in 1933 in Germany, Graham escaped the Holocaust, coming at age ten to the US, where he was adopted by a Jewish-German family but suffered psychological problems adjusting to American life. Progressing from running crap games at a Catskills hotel, he settled in San Francisco, where he managed a trucking company while yearning for a life in the arts. Taking a big pay cut, Graham became the manager of the San Francisco Mime Troupe; soon after, he began promoting rock concerts, using an old theater in a bad part of town as his venue. Graham built his empire on the Fillmore, eventually opening an N.Y.C. branch while moving into band- management, record production, and the lucrative business of rock souvenirs. He eventually closed both theaters but remained a force in the rock world, organizing charity events like Live Aid and the first Amnesty International tour. Although Graham was professionally successful, his personal life was often a shambles: He treated women poorly and was often strung out on cocaine, Ecstasy, and sleeping pills. Glatt relies mostly on others' written accounts and magazine interviews in compiling this bio (he even uses Graham's own Bill Graham Presents, 1992, which covers much of the same ground), but he did talk to a few Graham associates, particularly one of the promoter's ex-girlfriends, Regina Cartwright, who sheds some new light on Graham's fiery temperament. Glatt's British roots lead him to odd mistakes (he describes Kesey's Magic Bus as ``a brightly painted van''), and he's weak when discussing 60's social trends. In any case, Graham's life was so downbeat (he died in 1991 in a helicopter crash following a decade of new personal declines) that one wonders why we need another bio to supplement his own: for rock completists only. (Sixteen pages of b&w photographs--not seen.) -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

He read the Wall Street Journal on his grandmother's lap--and he got fired as a stock analyst for accurately predicting that Donald Trump's casinos couldn't succeed. Now president of his own Philadelphia money management firm, Roffman distills 35 years of experience into this reasoned approach to financial planning for individuals. Although he recommends personal savings ("rainy days will come--not . . . might ") and favors stocks for long term investment, Roffman meticulously explains other investment vehicles. With a chapter discussing the many ways stockbrokers can exploit customers, the book is not a guide to universal wealth and happiness but an order of battle for us-against-them--credit-card sharps, bankers, mutual fund managers, realtors and the uncooperative gyrations of interest rates and market values. Written with business journalist Schwager, this is an often humorous, always clear-headed memoir and one of the most valuable money books in memory.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.