The Best Books About Classic & Old Hollywood
“What are the best books about Old Hollywood?” We looked at 183 of the top books, aggregating and ranking them so we could answer that very question!
The top 23 titles, all appearing on 2 or more “Best Old Hollywood” book lists, are ranked below by how many times they appear. The remaining 150+ books, as well as the lists we used, are in alphabetical order on the bottom of the page.
Happy Scrolling!
Top 23 Books About Classic Hollywood
23 .) A Touch of Stardust by Kate Alcott
Lists It Appears On:
- Barnes & Noble
- Goodreads 2
“When Julie Crawford leaves Fort Wayne, Indiana, for Hollywood, she never imagines she’ll cross paths with Carole Lombard, the dazzling actress fromJulie’s provincial Midwestern hometown. The young woman has dreams of becoming a screenwriter, but the only job Julie’s able to find is one in the studio publicity office of the notoriously demanding producer David O. Selznick, who is busy burning through directors, writers, and money as he films Gone with the Wind.
Although tensions run high on the set, Julie finds she can step onto the back lot, take in the smell of smoky gunpowder and the soft rustle of hoop skirts, and feel the magical world of Gone with the Wind come to life. Julie’s access to real-life magic comes when Carole Lombard hires her as an assistant and invites her into the glamorous world Carole shares with Clark Gable, who is about to move into movie history as the dashing Rhett Butler.
Carole Lombard, happily profane and uninhibited, makes no secret of her relationship with Gable, which poses something of a problem for the studio because Gable is technically still married—and the last thing the film needs is more negative publicity. Julie is there to fend off the overly curious reporters, hoping to prevent details about the affair from slipping out. But she can barely keep up with her blond employer, let alone control what comes out of Carole’s mouth, and—as their friendship grows—Julie soon finds she doesn’t want to. Carole, both wise and funny, becomes Julie’s model for breaking free of the past.”
22 .) All the Stars in the Heavens by Adriana Trigiani
Lists It Appears On:
- Goodreads 2
- Off The Shelf
“In this spectacular saga as radiant, thrilling, and beguiling as Hollywood itself, Adriana Trigiani takes us back to Tinsel Town’s golden age—an era as brutal as it was resplendent—and into the complex and glamorous world of a young actress hungry for fame and success. With meticulous, beautiful detail, Trigiani paints a rich, historical landscape of 1930s Los Angeles, where European and American artisans flocked to pursue the ultimate dream: to tell stories on the silver screen.
The movie business is booming in 1935 when twenty-one-year-old Loretta Young meets thirty-four-year-old Clark Gable on the set of The Call of the Wild. Though he’s already married, Gable falls for the stunning and vivacious young actress instantly.
Far from the glittering lights of Hollywood, Sister Alda Ducci has been forced to leave her convent and begin a new journey that leads her to Loretta. Becoming Miss Young’s secretary, the innocent and pious young Alda must navigate the wild terrain of Hollywood with fierce determination and a moral code that derives from her Italian roots. Over the course of decades, she and Loretta encounter scandal and adventure, choose love and passion, and forge an enduring bond of love and loyalty that will be put to the test when they eventually face the greatest obstacle of their lives.
Anchored by Trigiani’s masterful storytelling that takes you on a worldwide ride of adventure from Hollywood to the shores of southern Italy, this mesmerizing epic is, at its heart, a luminous tale of the most cherished ties that bind. Brimming with larger-than-life characters both real and fictional—including stars Spencer Tracy, Myrna Loy, David Niven, Hattie McDaniel and more—it is it is the unforgettable story of one of cinema’s greatest love affairs during the golden age of American movie making.”
21 .) Ava Gardner: Love is Nothing by Lee Server
Lists It Appears On:
- Goodreads 2
- Huffington Post
“She was the sex symbol who dazzled all the other sex symbols. She was the temptress who drove Frank Sinatra to the brink of suicide and haunted him to the end of his life. Ernest Hemingway saved one of her kidney stones as a sacred memento, and Howard Hughes begged her to marry him―but she knocked out his front teeth instead.
She was one of the great icons in Hollywood history―star of The Killers, The Barefoot Contessa, and The Night of the Iguana―and one of the few whose actual life was grander and more colorful than any movie. Her jaw-dropping beauty, charismatic presence, and fabulous, scandalous adventures fueled the legend of Ava Gardner―Hollywood’s most glamorous, restless and uninhibited star.”
20 .) Bette and Joan: The Divine Feud by Shaun Considine
Lists It Appears On:
- Goodreads
- Goodreads 2
They were two of the most talented beauties Hollywood ever produced: the elegant Joan Crawford, a former chorus girl who shot through the ranks at MGM, and the brash, tempestuous Bette Davis, a Broadway star notorious for refusing to bow to the studio bosses. Their work together in the hit film Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? sowed the seeds for a mutual hatred that would consume their lives. As each fading star tried to outshine the other, lives were upended and reputations were destroyed. Glamorous, merciless, and cruel, their feud became the stuff of legends. Based on interviews the author conducted with both actresses and more than a decade of research, Bette & Joan shows the hard-drinking, hard-fighting duo at their best and worst. The epic story of these dueling divas is hilarious, monstrous, tragic, and the inspiration for the Ryan Murphy TV series Feud starring Susan Sarandon and Jessica Lange. Now updated with two new chapters and a sixteen-page photo insert.
19 .) Easy Riders, Raging Bulls: How the Sex-Drugs-And Rock ‘N’ Roll Generation Saved Hollywood by Peter Biskind
Lists It Appears On:
- The Hollywood Reporter
- Bustle
When the low-budget biker movie Easy Rider shocked Hollywood with its success in 1969, a new Hollywood era was born. This was an age when talented young filmmakers such as Scorsese, Coppola, and Spielberg, along with a new breed of actors, including De Niro, Pacino, and Nicholson, became the powerful figures who would make such modern classics as The Godfather, Chinatown, Taxi Driver, and Jaws. Easy Riders, Raging Bulls follows the wild ride that was Hollywood in the ’70s — an unabashed celebration of sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll (both onscreen and off) and a climate where innovation and experimentation reigned supreme. Based on hundreds of interviews with the directors themselves, producers, stars, agents, writers, studio executives, spouses, and ex-spouses, this is the full, candid story of Hollywood’s last golden age.
18 .) Harlow in Hollywood: The Blonde Bombshell in the Glamour Capital, 1928-1937 by Darrell Rooney and Mark A. Vieira
Lists It Appears On:
- Huffington Post
- Goodreads 2
“Scene 1: Harlean Carpenter comes to Hollywood.
Scene 2: Hollywood creates Jean Harlow.Scene 3: Her legend lives forever.
At last, the story of how Hollywood shaped a myth and determined a young woman’s reality. A town, a remarkable town, became the backdrop for one of Hollywood’s most incredible stories, a life rife with glamour, pleasure, power, and–in the end–utter sorrow. Her story lives in the pages and breathtaking pictures of Harlow in Hollywood. When Jean Harlow became the Blonde Bombshell, it was all Hollywood’s doing. She was the first big-screen sex symbol, the Platinum Blonde, the mold for every famous fair-haired superstar who would emulate her.”
17 .) Lion of Hollywood: The Life and Legend of Louis B. Mayer by Scott Eyman
Lists It Appears On:
- The Blonde At The Film
- Goodreads
“Lion of Hollywood is the definitive biography of Louis B. Mayer, the chief of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer — MGM — the biggest and most successful film studio of Hollywood’s Golden Age.
An immigrant from tsarist Russia, Mayer began in the film business as an exhibitor but soon migrated to where the action and the power were — Hollywood. Through sheer force of energy and foresight, he turned his own modest studio into MGM, where he became the most powerful man in Hollywood, bending the film business to his will. He made great films, including the fabulous MGM musicals, and he made great stars: Garbo, Gable, Garland, and dozens of others. Through the enormously successful Andy Hardy series, Mayer purveyed family values to America. At the same time, he used his influence to place a federal judge on the bench, pay off local officials, cover up his stars’ indiscretions, and, on occasion, arrange marriages for gay stars. Mayer rose from his impoverished childhood to become at one time the highest-paid executive in America.Despite his power and money, Mayer suffered some significant losses. He had two daughters: Irene, who married David O. Selznick, and Edie, who married producer William Goetz. He would eventually fall out with Edie and divorce his wife, Margaret, ending his life alienated from most of his family. His chief assistant, Irving Thalberg, was his closest business partner, but they quarreled frequently, and Thalberg’s early death left Mayer without his most trusted associate. As Mayer grew older, his politics became increasingly reactionary, and he found himself politically isolated within Hollywood’s small conservative community.”
16 .) Love, Lucy by Lucille Ball
Lists It Appears On:
- Chemistry Cachet
- Goodreads 2
“Love, Lucy is the valentine Lucille Ball left for her fans—a warm, wise, and witty memoir written by Lucy herself. The legendary star of the classic sitcom I Love Lucy was at the pinnacle of her success when she sat down to record the story of her life. No comedienne had made America laugh so hard, no television actress had made the leap from radio and B movies to become one of the world’s best-loved performers. This is her story—in her own words.
The story of the ingenue from Jamestown, New York, determined to go to Broadway, destined to make a big splash, bound to marry her Valentino, Desi Arnaz. In her own inimitable style, she tells of their life together—both storybook and turbulent; intimate memories of their children and friends; wonderful backstage anecdotes; the empire they founded; the dissolution of their marriage. And, with a heartfelt happy ending, her enduring marriage to Gary Morton.
Here is the lost manuscript that her fans and loved ones will treasure. Here is the laughter. Here is the life. Here’s Lucy…”
15 .) MGM: Hollywood’s Greatest Backlot by Steven Bingen, Stephen X. Sylvester, and Michael Troyan
Lists It Appears On:
- Huffington Post
- The Blonde At The Film
“M-G-M: Hollywood’s Greatest Backlot is the illustrated history of the soundstages and outdoor sets where Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer produced many of the world’s most famous films. During its Golden Age, the studio employed the likes of Garbo, Astaire, and Gable, and produced innumerable iconic pieces of cinema such as The Wizard of Oz, Singin’ in the Rain, and Ben-Hur.
It is estimated that a fifth of all films made in the United States prior to the 1970s were shot at MGM studios, meaning that the gigantic property was responsible for hundreds of iconic sets and stages, often utilizing and transforming minimal spaces and previously used props, to create some of the most recognizable and identifiable landscapes of modern movie culture.
All of this happened behind closed doors, the backlot shut off from the public in a veil of secrecy and movie magic. M-G-M: Hollywood’s Greatest Backlot highlights this fascinating film treasure by recounting the history, popularity, and success of the MGM company through a tour of its physical property.”
14 .) My Autobiography by Charlie Chaplin
Lists It Appears On:
- Goodreads 2
- Huffington Post
“Chaplin’s heartfelt and hilarious autobiography tells the story of his childhood, the challenge of identifying and perfecting his talent, his subsequent film career and worldwide celebrity. In this, one of the very first celebrity memoirs, Chaplin displays all the charms, peculiarities and deeply-held beliefs that made him such an endearing and lasting character.
Re-issued as part of Melville House’s Neversink Library, My Autobiography offers dedicated Chaplin fans and casual admirers alike an astonishing glimpse into the the heart and the mind of Hollywood’s original genius maverick.”
13 .) Scandals of Classic Hollywood: Sex, Deviance, and Drama from the Golden Age of American Cinema by Anne Helen Petersen
Lists It Appears On:
- Goodreads 2
- The Blonde At The Film
Believe it or not, America’s fascination with celebrity culture was thriving well before the days of TMZ, Perez Hilton, Charlie Sheen’s breakdown, and allegations against Woody Allen. And the stars of yesteryear? They weren’t always the saints that we make them out to be. Part biography, part cultural history, the stories contained in this book cover the stuff that films are made of: love, sex, drugs, illegitimate children, illicit affairs, and botched cover-ups. Based on Anne Helen Petersen’s popular column on the Hairpin, Scandals of Classic Hollywood is sensationalism made smart.
12 .) Silent Stars by Jeanine Basinger
Lists It Appears On:
- Goodreads
- Goodreads 2
“From one of America’s most renowned film scholars: a revelatory, perceptive, and highly readable look at the greatest silent film stars — not those few who are fully appreciated and understood, like Chaplin, Keaton, Gish, and Garbo, but those who have been misperceived, unfairly dismissed, or forgotten.
Here is Valentino, “”the Sheik,”” who was hardly the effeminate lounge lizard he’s been branded as; Mary Pickford, who couldn’t have been further from the adorable little creature with golden ringlets that was her film persona; Marion Davies, unfairly pilloried in Citizen Kane; the original “”Phantom”” and “”Hunchback,”” Lon Chaney; the beautiful Talmadge sisters, Norma and Constance. Here are the great divas, Pola Negri and Gloria Swanson; the great flappers, Colleen Moore and Clara Bow; the great cowboys, William S. Hart and Tom Mix; and the great lover, John Gilbert. Here, too, is the quintessential slapstick comedienne, Mabel Normand, with her Keystone Kops; the quintessential all-American hero, Douglas Fairbanks; and, of course, the quintessential all-American dog, Rin-Tin-Tin.
This is the first book to anatomize the major silent players, reconstruct their careers, and give us a sense of what those films, those stars, and that Hollywood were all about. An absolutely essential text for anyone seriously interested in movies, and, with more than three hundred photographs, as much a treat to look at as it is to read.”
11 .) Sin in Soft Focus: Pre-Code Hollywood by Mark A. Vieira
Lists It Appears On:
- Goodreads
- Goodreads 2
Looks at motion picture history during the decade before the Hollywood production code was established
10 .) The Million Dollar Mermaid: An Autobiography by Esther Williams
Lists It Appears On:
- Goodreads 2
- The Blonde At The Film
“Now, for the hundreds of thousands of people who read and loved both of Niven’s books, comes Esther Williams’s wonderfully witty, fresh, and frank autobiography, all about an eighteen-year-old girl who reluctantly answers the siren call of MGM — at the time, the most powerful and prestigious movie studio in the world — and who soon finds herself launched on a career that will last more than twenty years, during which time she will help to create a genre of film that seems almost unimaginable today, yet which still holds all its original freshness and fascination, and who becomes during those years one of the world’s top box office stars.
Williams calls MGM her “”university,”” and the education she got there was one in how to project glamour and femininity, how to make yourself desirable while always, always playing the lady. No one who were through that university has ever written before with such absolute candor about what it was really like — the affairs, the gossip, the tricks of the trade, the competition, the deals, the fights, and the methods the studios had for keeping their stars in line.”
9 .) The Parade’s Gone By… by Kevin Brownlow
Lists It Appears On:
- Goodreads
- Goodreads 2
The magic of the silent screen, illuminated by the recollections of those who created it.
8 .) The Player by Michael Tolkin
Lists It Appears On:
- Bustle
- The Daily Beast
“Griffin Mill is ruthlessly ambitious, driven to control the levers of America’s dream-making machinery. Griffin listens to writers pitch him stories all day, sitting in judgment on their fantasies, their lives. But now one writer to whose pitch he responded so glibly is sending him postcards: “”You said you’d get back to me. You didn’t. And now in the name of all writers who get pushed around by studio executives I’m going to kill you.””
Squeezed between the threat to his life and the threat to his job, Griffin’s deliberate and horrifying response spins him into a nightmare. Then he meets the sad and beautiful June Mercator and his obsession for her threatens to destroy them both.
With a compulsively readable narrative that offers a devastating portrait of contemporary Hollywood–the studio execs, the deal-making, the politics, the pitches–The Player is the smartest book.”
7 .) The Prince of Beverly Hills by Stuart Woods
Lists It Appears On:
- Off The Shelf
- Goodreads
Los Angeles, 1939. It’s Hollywood’s Golden Age, and Rick Barron is a suave and sharp detective on the Beverly Hills force. After a run-in with his captain, he finds himself demoted, but soon lands a job on the security detail for Centurion Pictures, one of the hottest studios. The white knight of such movie stars as Clete Barrow, the British leading man with a penchant for parties, and Glenna Gleason, a peach of a talent on the verge of superstardom, Rick is dubbed “the Prince of Beverly Hills” by society columnists. But when he unearths a murder cover-up and a blackmail scam, he finds himself up against West Coast wise guys whose stakes are do-or-die…
6 .) The Star Machine by Jeanine Basinger
Lists It Appears On:
- Goodreads
- Goodreads 2
“From one of our most distinguished film scholars, comes a rich, penetrating, amusing book about the golden age of movies and how the studios worked to manufacture stars.
With revelatory insights and delightful asides, Jeanine Basinger shows us how the studio “star machine” worked when it worked, how it failed when it didn’t, and how irrelevant it could sometimes be. She gives us case studies focusing on big stars groomed into the system: the “awesomely beautiful” (and disillusioned) Tyrone Power; the seductive, disobedient Lana Turner; and a dazzling cast of others. She anatomizes their careers, showing how their fame happened, and what happened to them as a result. Deeply engrossing, full of energy, wit, and wisdom, The Star Machine is destined to become an classic of the film canon.”
5 .) Tinseltown: Murder, Morphine, and Madness at the Dawn of Hollywood by William J. Mann
Lists It Appears On:
- Huffington Post
- Goodreads 2
“The Day of the Locust meets The Devil in the White City and Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil in this juicy, untold Hollywood story: an addictive true tale of ambition, scandal, intrigue, murder, and the creation of the modern film industry.
By 1920, the movies had suddenly become America’s new favorite pastime, and one of the nation’s largest industries. Never before had a medium possessed such power to influence. Yet Hollywood’s glittering ascendency was threatened by a string of headline-grabbing tragedies—including the murder of William Desmond Taylor, the popular president of the Motion Picture Directors Association, a legendary crime that has remained unsolved until now.
In a fiendishly involving narrative, bestselling Hollywood chronicler William J. Mann draws on a rich host of sources, including recently released FBI files, to unpack the story of the enigmatic Taylor and the diverse cast that surrounded him—including three beautiful, ambitious actresses; a grasping stage mother; a devoted valet; and a gang of two-bit thugs, any of whom might have fired the fatal bullet. And overseeing this entire landscape of intrigue was Adolph Zukor, the brilliant and ruthless founder of Paramount, locked in a struggle for control of the industry and desperate to conceal the truth about the crime. Along the way, Mann brings to life Los Angeles in the Roaring Twenties: a sparkling yet schizophrenic town filled with party girls, drug dealers, religious zealots, newly-minted legends and starlets already past their prime—a dangerous place where the powerful could still run afoul of the desperate.”
4 .) West of Sunset by Stewart O’Nan
Lists It Appears On:
- Barnes & Noble
- Off The Shelf
“In 1937, F. Scott Fitzgerald was a troubled, uncertain man whose literary success was long over. In poor health, with his wife consigned to an asylum and his finances in ruin, he struggled to make a new start as a screenwriter in Hollywood.
Those last three years of Fitzgerald’s life are the focus of Stewart O’Nan’s graceful and elegiac novel West of Sunset. With flashbacks to Fitzgerald’s glamorous Jazz Age past, the story follows him as he arrives on the MGM lot, falls in love with brassy gossip columnist Sheilah Graham, begins work on The Last Tycoon, and tries to maintain a semblance of family life with the absent Zelda and their daughter, Scottie. The Golden Age of Hollywood is brought vividly to life through the novel’s romantic cast of characters, from Dorothy Parker and Ernest Hemingway to Humphrey Bogart. Written with striking grace and subtlety, this is a wise and intimate portrait of a man trying his best to hold together a world that’s flying apart.”
3 .) Hollywood Babylon by Kenneth Anger
Lists It Appears On:
- Bustle
- Goodreads
- Goodreads 2
Originally published in Paris, this is a collection of Hollywood’s darkest and best kept secrets from the pen of Kenneth Anger, a former child movie actor who grew up to become one of America’s leading underground film-makers.
2 .) The Day of the Locust by Nathanael West
Lists It Appears On:
- Bustle
- Goodreads
- The Daily Beast
“The Day of the Locust” is the celebrated 1939 novel about the Great Depression, set in Hollywood, California, its over-arching themes dealing with the alienation and desperation of a broad group of odd individuals who exist at the fringes of the Hollywood movie industry.
1 .) City of Nets: A Portrait of Hollywood in the 1940s by Otto Friedrich
Lists It Appears On:
- The Fedora Lounge
- Goodreads
- Goodreads 2
- The Hollywood Reporter
“In 1939, fifty million Americans went to the movies every week, Louis B. Mayer was the highest-paid man in the country, and Hollywood produced 530 feature films a year. One decade and five thousand movies later, the studios were faltering. The 1940s became the decade of Hollywood’s decline: anticommunist hysteria excommunicated some of its best talent, while a 1948 antitrust consent decree ended many of the business practices that had made the studio system so profitable.
In this masterful work of cultural history, the legendary Otto Friedrich tells the story of Hollywood’s heyday and decline in a vivid narrative featuring an all-star cast of the actors, writers, musicians, composers, producers, directors, racketeers, labor leaders, journalists, and politicians who played major parts in the movie capital during the turbulent decade from World War II to the Korean War.
Friedrich draws on sources from celebrity biographies to trade-union history, mingling lively gossip with analysis of Hollywood’s seedier business dealings and telling the stories of legendary movies such as Citizen Kane, The Maltese Falcon, Double Indemnity, and All About Eve.”
The 150 Additional Best Early Hollywood Books
| # | Book | Author | Lists |
| (Titles Appear On 1 List Each) | |||
| 24 | A Bright and Guilty Place: Murder, Corruption, and L.A.’s Scandalous Coming of Age | Richard Rayner | Goodreads |
| 25 | A Life | Elia Kazan | The Hollywood Reporter |
| 26 | A Long Hard Look at “Psycho” | Raymond Durgnat | Goodreads |
| 27 | Adventures in the Screen Trade | William Goldman | The Hollywood Reporter |
| 28 | Adventures with DW Griffith | Karl Brown | The Fedora Lounge |
| 29 | Agee on Film: Criticism and Comment on the Movies | James Agee | Goodreads |
| 30 | American Lightning: Terror, Mystery, the Birth of Hollywood & the Crime of the Century | Howard Blum | Goodreads |
| 31 | American Silent Film | William K. Everson | Goodreads |
| 32 | An Encyclopedic Dictionary of Women in Early American Films: 1895-1930 | Denise Lowe | Goodreads |
| 33 | At the Center of the Frame | William M. Drew | Goodreads |
| 34 | Ava Gardner: The Secret Conversations | Peter Evans | Goodreads 2 |
| 35 | Ava: My Story | Ava Gardner | Goodreads 2 |
| 36 | Bells of Avalon | Libbet Bradstreet | Goodreads |
| 37 | Beverly Hills Dead (Rick Barron, #2) | Stuart Woods | Goodreads |
| 38 | Blonde | Joyce Carol Oates | Off The Shelf |
| 39 | Bloodletting: Book 4.0 – Bette | Joe Humphrey | Goodreads |
| 40 | Bombshell: The Life and Death of Jean Harlow | David Stenn | Goodreads 2 |
| 41 | Broken Silence: Conversations with 23 Silent Film Stars | Michael G. Ankerich | Goodreads |
| 42 | By Myself | Lauren Bacall | Goodreads 2 |
| 43 | By Myself and Then Some | Lauren Bacall | Goodreads 2 |
| 44 | Children of Light | Robert Stone | The Daily Beast |
| 45 | Chuck Amuck: The Life and Time of an Animated Cartoonist | Chuck Jones | Goodreads |
| 46 | Clara Bow: Runnin’ Wild | David Stenn | Goodreads 2 |
| 47 | Complicated Women: Sex and Power in Pre-Code Hollywood | Mick LaSalle | Goodreads 2 |
| 48 | Confessions of a Hollywood Agent | William Louis Gardner | Goodreads |
| 49 | Conversations with Classic Film Stars: Interviews from Hollywood’s Golden Era | James Bawden | Goodreads |
| 50 | Conversations with the Great Moviemakers of Hollywood’s Golden Age at the American Film Institute | George Stevens Jr. | Goodreads |
| 51 | Dangerous Curves Atop Hollywood Heels: The Lives, Careers, and Misfortunes of 14 Hard-Luck Girls of the Silent Screen | Michael G. Ankerich | Goodreads |
| 52 | Dark Lover: The Life and Death of Rudolph Valentino | Emily W. Leider | Goodreads 2 |
| 53 | Dark Victory: The Life of Bette Davis | Ed Sikov | Goodreads 2 |
| 54 | Dean and Me: A Love Story | Jerry Lewis | Goodreads 2 |
| 55 | Die a Little | Megan Abbott | Barnes & Noble |
| 56 | Down and Dirty Pictures: Miramax, Sundance, and the Rise of Independent Film | Peter Biskind | Bustle |
| 57 | Dream Palaces: Hollywood at Home | Charles Lockwood | Goodreads |
| 58 | Drive-in Dream Girls: A Galaxy of B-Movie Starlets of the Sixties | Tom Lisanti | Goodreads |
| 59 | Falling Waters | Gary D. Henry | Goodreads |
| 60 | Fantasy Femmes of Sixties Cinema | Tom Lisanti | Goodreads |
| 61 | Farber on Film: The Complete Film Writings | Manny Farber | Goodreads |
| 62 | Farewell, My Lovely (Philip Marlowe, #2) | Raymond Chandler | Goodreads |
| 63 | Fearing the Dark: The Val Lewton Career | Edmund G. Bansak | Goodreads |
| 64 | Femme Noir: Bad Girls of Film | Karen Burroughs Hannsberry | Goodreads |
| 65 | Final Cut | Steven Bach | The Hollywood Reporter |
| 66 | Flesh And Fantasy | Penny Stallings | Goodreads |
| 67 | Forgotten Hollywood Forgotten History | Manny Pacheco | Goodreads |
| 68 | Fragments: Poems, Intimate Notes, Letters | Marilyn Monroe | Goodreads 2 |
| 69 | Garbo | Barry Paris | Goodreads 2 |
| 70 | Ginger: My Story | Ginger Rogers | Goodreads 2 |
| 71 | Girl About Town | Adam Shankman and Laura L. Sullivan | Off The Shelf |
| 72 | Glamour Girls of Sixties Hollywood: Seventy-Five Profiles | Tom Lisanti | Goodreads |
| 73 | Goddess: The Secret Lives of Marilyn Monroe | Anthony Summers | Goodreads 2 |
| 74 | Golden Images: 41 Essays on Silent Film Stars | Eve Golden | Goodreads |
| 75 | Goldwyn | A. Scott Berg | Goodreads |
| 76 | Grace | Robert Lacey | Goodreads |
| 77 | Harpo Speaks! | Harpo Marx with Rowland Barber | The Fedora Lounge |
| 78 | Hedda Hopper’s Hollywood: Celebrity Gossip and American Conservatism | Jennifer Frost | Goodreads |
| 79 | Hitchcock by Truffaut: The Definitive Study | The Fedora Lounge | |
| 80 | Hollywood and History: Costume Design in Film | Edward Maeder | Goodreads |
| 81 | Hollywood Dreams Made Real: Irving Thalberg and the Rise of M-G-M | Mark A. Vieira | Goodreads |
| 82 | Hollywood Love Stories | Chemistry Cachet | |
| 83 | Hollywood Remembered: An Oral History of Its Golden Age | Paul Zollo | Goodreads |
| 84 | Hollywood Starlet (The Pacific Pictures Series) | Kelly Durham | Goodreads |
| 85 | Hollywood: The Pioneers | Kevin Brownlow | Goodreads |
| 86 | Hot Toddy: The True Story of Hollywood’s Most Sensational Murder | Andy Edmonds | Goodreads |
| 87 | How to Be a Movie Star: Elizabeth Taylor in Hollywood | William J. Mann | Goodreads 2 |
| 88 | I, Fatty | Jerry Stahl | Huffington Post |
| 89 | Idols of Modernity: Movie Stars of the 1920s | Patrice Petro | Goodreads |
| 90 | If This Was Happiness: A Biography of Rita Hayworth | Barbara Leaming | Goodreads 2 |
| 91 | In the Picture: Production Stills from the TCM Archives | Turner Classic Movies | Goodreads |
| 92 | Indecent Exposure | David McClintick | The Hollywood Reporter |
| 93 | Inside Warner Bros. (1935-1951) | Rudy Behlmer | Goodreads |
| 94 | Kate: The Woman Who Was Hepburn | William J. Mann | Goodreads 2 |
| 95 | Lana: the Lady, the Legend, the Truth | Lana Turner | Goodreads 2 |
| 96 | Laura Lamont’s Life in Pictures | Emma Straub | Off The Shelf |
| 97 | LIFE Hidden Hollywood: Rare Images of a Golden Age | The Editors of LIFE | Goodreads |
| 98 | Liz: An Intimate Biography of Elizabeth Taylor | Chemistry Cachet | |
| 99 | Louise Brooks: A Biography | Barry Paris | Goodreads 2 |
| 100 | Lulu in Hollywood | Louise Brooks | Goodreads 2 |
| 101 | Marilyn Monroe: The Biography | Donald Spoto | Goodreads 2 |
| 102 | Marilyn’s Red Diary | E.Z. Friedel | Goodreads |
| 103 | Me: Stories of My Life | Katharine Hepburn | Goodreads 2 |
| 104 | Memo from David O. Selznick | Rudy Behlmer | The Hollywood Reporter |
| 105 | Monkey Business: The Lives and Legends of the Marx Brothers | Simon Louvish | The Fedora Lounge |
| 106 | Montgomery Clift: A Biography | Patricia Bosworth | Goodreads 2 |
| 107 | Movie Star Homes: The Famous to the Forgotten | Judy Artunian | Goodreads |
| 108 | My First Time in Hollywood: Stories from the Pioneers, Dreamers and Misfits Who Made the Movies | Cari Beauchamp | Goodreads |
| 109 | My Hollywood: When Both of Us Were Young | Patsy Ruth Miller | Goodreads |
| 110 | My Wicked, Wicked Ways | Errol Flynn | Huffington Post |
| 111 | Myrna Loy: Being and Becoming | James Kotsilibas-Davis | Goodreads 2 |
| 112 | Myrna Loy: The Only Good Girl in Hollywood | Emily W. Leider | Goodreads 2 |
| 113 | Natasha: The Biography of Natalie Wood | Suzanne Finstad | Goodreads 2 |
| 114 | Of All the Gin Joints: Stumbling through Hollywood History | Mark Bailey | Goodreads |
| 115 | Pickford: The Woman Who Made Hollywood | Eileen Whitfield | Goodreads 2 |
| 116 | Pictures at a Revolution: Five Movies and the Birth of the New Hollywood | Mark Harris | The Hollywood Reporter |
| 117 | Play It As It Lays | Joan Didion | The Daily Beast |
| 118 | Robert Mitchum: Solid, Dad, Crazy | Damien Love | Goodreads |
| 119 | Round Up the Usual Suspects: The Making of Casablanca–Bogart, Bergman, and World War II | Aljean Harmetz | The Blonde At The Film |
| 120 | Screen Deco: A Celebration of High Style in Hollywood | Howard Mandelbaum | Goodreads |
| 121 | Self-Portrait | Gene Tierney | Goodreads 2 |
| 122 | Severed: The True Story of the Black Dahlia Murder | John Gilmore | Goodreads |
| 123 | Shake Well Before Using: A New Collection of Impressions and Anecdotes Mostly Humorous | Bennett Cerf | Goodreads |
| 124 | Silent Movies: The Birth of Film and the Triumph of Movie Culture | Peter Kobel | Goodreads |
| 125 | Silent Murders | Mary Miley | Barnes & Noble |
| 126 | Silent Players: A Biographical and Autobiographical Study of 100 Silent Film Actors and Actresses | Anthony Slide | Goodreads |
| 127 | Silent Stars Speak: Interviews with Twelve Cinema Pioneers | Tony Villecco | Goodreads |
| 128 | Son of Forgotten Hollywood Forgotten History | Manny Pacheco | Goodreads |
| 129 | Speaking of Silents | William M. Drew | Goodreads |
| 130 | Stan and Ollie | Simon Louvish | The Fedora Lounge |
| 131 | Stardust | Joseph Kanon | Off The Shelf |
| 132 | Supporting Features: Writing and Interviews on Movies and Moviemakers | Damien Love | Goodreads |
| 133 | Temporary Alliance: A Story of Old Hollywood (The Pacific Pictures Series Book 2) | Kelly Durham | Goodreads |
| 134 | The American Film Industryedited | Tino Balio | The Blonde At The Film |
| 135 | The Big Sleep (Philip Marlowe, #1) | Raymond Chandler | Goodreads |
| 136 | The Black Dahlia | James Ellroy | Off The Shelf |
| 137 | The Dark Side Of Genius: The Life Of Alfred Hitchcock | Donald Spoto | Goodreads |
| 138 | The Entertainer: Movies, Magic, and My Father’s Twentieth Century | Margaret Talbot | Goodreads |
| 139 | The Forgotten Flapper | Laini Giles | Off The Shelf |
| 140 | The Garden of Allah | Sheilah Graham | Goodreads |
| 141 | The Garden on Sunset | Martin Turnbull | Off The Shelf |
| 142 | The Genius of the System | Thomas Schatz | The Fedora Lounge |
| 143 | The Girl Who Walked Home Alone: A Personal Biography of Bette Davis | Charlotte Chandler | Goodreads 2 |
| 144 | The Girls: Sappho Goes to Hollywood | Diana McLellan | Goodreads 2 |
| 145 | The Glamour Factory: Inside Hollywood’s Big Studio System | Ronald L. Davis | Goodreads |
| 146 | The Invisible Art: The Legends of Movie Matte Painting | Mark Cotta Vaz | Goodreads |
| 147 | The Kid Stays in the Picture | Robert Evans | Bustle |
| 148 | The Last Tycoon: An Unfinished Novel | F. Scott Fitzgerald | The Daily Beast |
| 149 | The Long Goodbye (Philip Marlowe, #6) | Raymond Chandler | Goodreads |
| 150 | The Love of the Last Tycoon | F. Scott Fitzgerald | Off The Shelf |
| 151 | The Loved One | Evelyn Waugh | Barnes & Noble |
| 152 | The Making of Some Like It Hot: My Memories of Marilyn Monroe and the Classic American Movie | Tony Curtis | Goodreads |
| 153 | The Movie Star and Me | Kelly Durham | Goodreads |
| 154 | The Name Above the Title | Frank Capra | The Hollywood Reporter |
| 155 | The Noir Style | Alain Silver | Goodreads |
| 156 | The Pat Hobby Stories | F. Scott Fitzgerald | The Fedora Lounge |
| 157 | The Secret Life of Marilyn Monroe | J. Randy Taraborrelli | Goodreads 2 |
| 158 | The Shocking Miss Pilgrim: A Writer in Early Hollywood | Frederica Sagor Maas | Goodreads |
| 159 | The Sound of Silence: Conversations with 16 Film and Stage Personalities Who Bridged the Gap Between Silents and Talkies | Michael G. Ankerich | Goodreads |
| 160 | The Story of Hollywood: An Illustrated History | Gregory Paul Williams | Huffington Post |
| 161 | The Women of Warner Brothers: The Lives and Careers of 15 Leading Ladies, with Filmographies for Each | Daniel Bubbeo | Goodreads |
| 162 | Those Crazy, Wonderful Years When We Ran Warner Bros. | Stuart Jerome | Goodreads |
| 163 | Transcendental Style in Film: Ozu, Bresson, Dreyer | Paul Schrader | The Hollywood Reporter |
| 164 | True Hollywood Noir: Filmland Mysteries and Murders | Dina Di Mambro | Goodreads |
| 165 | Try and Stop Me | Bennett Cerf | Goodreads |
| 166 | Two Lovers,: the love Story of Carole Lombard and Russ Columbo | Beverly Adam | Goodreads |
| 167 | Unsinkable | Chemistry Cachet | |
| 168 | Val Lewton: The Reality of Terror | Joel E. Siegel | Goodreads |
| 169 | Victor Fleming: An American Movie Master | Michael Sragow | Goodreads |
| 170 | Vivien Leigh: A Biography | Anne Edwards | Goodreads 2 |
| 171 | Vivien: The Life of Vivien Leigh | Alexander Walker | Goodreads 2 |
| 172 | Vixens, Floozies, and Molls: 28 Actresses of Late 1920s and 1930s Hollywood | Hans J. Wollstein | Goodreads |
| 173 | Walking With Dead People – Hollywood | Mary-Beth Brophy | Goodreads |
| 174 | Watch Me: A Memoir | Anjelica Huston | Bustle |
| 175 | What Makes Sammy Run? | Budd Schulberg | Bustle |
| 176 | What You See in the Dark | Manuel Muñoz | Barnes & Noble |
| 177 | When the Movies Were Young | Linda Arvidson | Goodreads |
| 178 | Who the Hell’s in It: Conversations With Hollywood’s Legendary Actors | Peter Bogdanovich | Goodreads |
| 179 | Why a Duck?: Visual and Verbal Gems from the Marx Brothers Movies | Richard J. Anobile | Goodreads |
| 180 | Without Lying Down: Screenwriter Frances Marion and the Powerful Women of Early Hollywood | Cari Beauchamp | Goodreads 2 |
| 181 | Women in Horror Films, 1930s | Gregory William Mank | Goodreads |
| 182 | You Must Remember This: Life and Style in Hollywood’s Golden Age | Robert J. Wagner | Goodreads |
| 183 | You’ll Never Eat Lunch in This Town Again | Julia Phillips | Bustle |
11 Best Old Hollywood Book Sources/Lists
| Source | Article |
| Barnes & Noble | 6 Irresistible Novels About Old Hollywood |
| Bustle | 10 Juicy Hollywood Books To Get You Prepped For the Golden Globes |
| Chemistry Cachet | 4 Books to Read if You Love Hollywood’s Golden Age |
| Goodreads | Best Books on Old Hollywood |
| Goodreads 2 | Popular Old Hollywood Books |
| Huffington Post | 8 Books That Will Transport You To Old Hollywood |
| Off The Shelf | 11 Scandalous Novels That Illuminate the Golden Age of Hollywood |
| The Blonde At The Film | Great Books on Classic Movies |
| The Daily Beast | The 5 Best Novels on Hollywood |
| The Fedora Lounge | Books about Golden Age Hollywood |
| The Hollywood Reporter | Galloway on Film: The 10 Greatest Movie Books |
