Fade To Black: Graveside Memories of Hollywood Greats 1927-1950 By Michael Thomas Barry

Schiffer Publishing Ltd; First Ed February 2011 ISBN: 978-0764337093 pages: 160; softcopy; price: $24.99

Every now and then I like to read books related to grave hunting. If I like the graving book I’m reading, I usually give a decent review for the readers of the Gravecast blog. As in the case for my next review.

In March 2011 a month after “Fade To Black: Graveside Memories of Hollywood Greats 1927-1950” by Michael Thomas Barry was published. I put in an order for the book from the website Amazon.  So here is my review.

To give you a brief rundown on what “Fade To Black: Graveside Memories of Hollywood Greats 1927-1950” entails. It chronicles the winners of the Academy Awards covering the years 1927 through 1950.  Each person who won during the years covered under the categories of Best Actor/Actress, Best Supporting Actor/Actress, & Best Director, are chronicled with concise biographical narratives. The names of runner-up’s are also given but there is no biographical narration for that person, unless they won the award under their category for a different year.

One of the things I think really stand out in “Fade To Black” is the full spectrum, of full-page portrait photos of the celebrities highlighted in the book, not to mention the abundance of graveside photos, and photos from the award ceremonies.

Another thing I thought was a nice touch is the inclusion of Appendix A-C which cover a biographical narrative on Louis B. Mayer (Appendix A), a full listing of The Original Thirty-Six Members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences w/graveside locations (Appendix B), and finally Cemetery Addresses (Appendix C) which has a listing of all the cemeteries mentioned in the book where the award winners are buried.

There isn’t a thing I did not like about “Fade To Black”, the photos, and biographical narratives, are great. So I highly recommend this book.

On a side note “Fade To Black: Graveside Memories of Hollywood Greats 1927-1950” is Michael Thomas Barry’s second literary work. His first book “Final Resting Places: Orange County’s Dead & Famous” is another book I highly recommend and was published in 2010. The writing style, is hugely improved in Michael’s second book, compared to his first book.