Six Degrees of Paris Hilton: Inside the Sex Tapes, Scandals, and Shakedowns of the New Hollywood [Hardcover]

Mark Ebner (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 3, 2009

In the burgeoning Hollywood club scene, where ecstasy dealers dine alongside celebrities, and illicit money bubbles up from below like the La Brea Tar Pits, a handsome double-murderer and ex-con of refined wit and taste charmed his way into young Hollywood's most elite social circles. Serving as their hired muscle and arbiter of street justice, he ultimately went on to expose their scandalous, hard-kept secrets -- all the while waging a criminal campaign against the ill-deserving rich and famous.

Filled with sex, drugs, and sudden violence, "Six Degrees of Paris Hilton: Inside the Sex Tapes, Scandals, and Shakedowns of the New Hollywood" is the shocking true tale of Darnell Riley, a well-mannered middle-class kid from Los Angeles who reinvented himself as a stone-cold gangster in the boxing gyms and bruising streets of South Central, before serving seven years for a double homicide at fifteen. Released at age twenty-three, he infiltrated a far more decadent crowd whose privileged lifestyle is familiar to most only in weekly magazines. During his six-year stab at Hollywood, Darnell ran with its It girls and bully boys: He befriended Paris Hilton; was associated with "multiple" sex tapes; held "Girls Gone Wild" founder Joe Francis at gunpoint and humiliated him on camera; dated models; ran numbers; trafficked in drugs; carried out contract beatings; and "possibly" staged a daring series of home-invasion robberies, many of which were attributed to the infamous Bel-Air Burglar.

In a potent real-life mix of "Entourage" and "The Wire," award-winning journalist Mark Ebner follows Darnell's riveting story, from exclusive interviews conducted inside Corcoran State Prison, through the mean streets of Los Angeles, employing a Rogues Gallery of characters unrivaled in modern crime.

The ultimate expose of the greed, hypocrisy, and vulgarity behind Hollywood's new breed of feral rich and illicitly famous, Six Degrees of Paris Hilton is a front-row seat to the best show in town.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A totally absorbing, outrageous book." -- Evan Wright, author of "Generation Kill"

About the Author

Mark Ebner is a New York Times bestselling author and investigative journalist.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Gallery Books; 1st Simon Spotlight Entertainment Hardcover Ed edition (February 3, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1416959343
• ISBN-13: 978-1416959342
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.3 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (47 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #629,943 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

New York Times best selling author Mark Ebner is an award winning investigative journalist who has covered all aspects of celebrity and crime culture for Spy, Rolling Stone, Details, Los Angeles, Premiere, Salon, Spin, Radar and New Times among other national and international publications. He has repeatedly positioned himself in harm's way, conducting over fifty in-depth investigations into such subjects as Scientology, Pit Bull fighting in South Central Los Angeles, the Ku Klux Klan in Texas, celebrity stalkers, drug dealers, missing porn stars, sports groupies, college suicides and Hepatitis C in Hollywood.

Ebner has produced for and/or appeared as a journalist-commentator on NBC, ABC, CBS, MSNBC, A&E, The BBC, Channel 4 (UK), National Public Radio, Court TV, FX, VH-1 and E! Entertainment Television. He has been a featured guest on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, The Today Show, The Early Show, Inside Edition, Tough Crowd with Colin Quinn, Fox & Friends, Catherine Crier Live, and a host of other television and radio programs in the US, Canada, the United Kingdom and Asia. In 2000, Ebner hosted his own nationally syndicated radio program, Drastic Radio, and co-authored the New York Times/Los Angeles Times best-seller, "Hollywood, Interrupted" in 2005 with Andrew Breitbart of the Drudge Report.

Ebner consulted on the Emmy-nominated "Trapped In The Closet" episode of South Park for Comedy Central, consulted for NBC/Dateline on the "Paris Hilton Tapes" report, and field produced a one-hour VH1 special on the same topic. He also hosted "Rich and Reckless," a crime show for TruTV, recently authored the Hollywood crime book "Six Degrees of Paris Hilton" for Simon Spotlight Entertainment, and blogs breaking news from the corner of Hollywood & Crime at HollywoodInterrupted.com.

Ebner is represented by Joel Gotler:

The Intellectual Property Group
9200 Sunset Blvd., Suite 820
Los Angeles, CA 90069
tel: [phone]
fax: [phone]

[e-mail]

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gritty, glittering gripping crime drma, January 23, 2009

By 

Jim (Los Angeles, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Six Degrees of Paris Hilton: Inside the Sex Tapes, Scandals, and Shakedowns of the New Hollywood (Hardcover)

Ebner can write--I am a big fan of his blog hollywoodinterrupted.com, and his articles for RADAR where I first read him. This story is a deep, griping, nasty, exciting, star studded, crime filled, intense look at the "pretty people" and their dangerous play pals. THE MUST READ BOOK for anyone interested in Hollywood, crime, celebrities--Six Degrees of Paris Hilton is FACT but it reads like a novel, great turns of phrases, plot twists, awesome characters...and it's REAL. Wild!

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Truth? Fiction? Either Way, A Fascinating Read, January 30, 2009

By 

Adam J. Loewy (Austin, TX) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Six Degrees of Paris Hilton: Inside the Sex Tapes, Scandals, and Shakedowns of the New Hollywood (Hardcover)

This is one of the most original and well-researched books I have read in some time. Mark Ebner starts with one fairly publicized crime - the kidnapping of Joe Francis - and unweaves a vast web of the characters, businesses, crimes, and stars that all are somehow related to this crime. In doing so, he paints a fascinating, if not downright scary, picture of modern day Hollywood.

This is not quick read. It is 285 pages and the words go the entire length of the page; if it was printed like a regular book, it would probably be 350+ pages. However, despite its length, it is truly fascinating. Ebner did A LOT of research for this book. The story just keeps getting more and more interesting, and Ebner has a gift of describing the people and events in the book in such a way that you feel you are watching a movie about all of this.

The only critique I have of this book is whether it can be called 'non-fiction.' Even Ebner admits that he doesn't know if many of these stories are actually true - indeed, his muse (Darnell Riley) is sitting in a prison and clearly has reason to exagerrate his claims. But to Ebner's credit, he admits all of this and is extremely honest with the reader. Many writers would just pass a story like this off as a "100% true" but Ebner admits this probably isn't the case.

In the end, though, it just doesn't matter how "true" this entire story is because no one will ever really know. The beauty of this book is every single story, every single chapter, and every single connection, ranges from intersting to very intersting to downright fascinating. It is a very good book and if you are interested in the 'true' Hollywood or like crime stories, you need to read it. I really look forward to Ebner's next book. He is a very talented writer.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars More Info About Hollywood Than I Ever Needed to Know!, January 24, 2009

By 

J. G. Peterson "Dance Music LOVER" (Raleigh, NC) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Six Degrees of Paris Hilton: Inside the Sex Tapes, Scandals, and Shakedowns of the New Hollywood (Hardcover)

Having been a fan of Mark Ebner's reporting for years now, this book of heavy-hitting revelations has me completely absorbed. While the title might imply that this book is a tome about the over-exposed Paris Hilton, it's really more of an examination into the lives of the the criminal nature of the Hollywood scene and how they all seem to have a tie to Paris Hilton, which just makes the contents all the more frightening. We already knew Hollywood was rife with weirdness but this book exposes it in a way my mind can barely comprehend (if at all). Definitely a good read and re-read!