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

by Mark Ebner (Author)
Key Phrases: erin naas, golden palace, sex tape, Mark Ebner, Joe Francis, Will Wright (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"Lurid and masterful reporting. Every word rings true with an insider's absolute knowledge of Hollywood's rich and famous. Fiendishly ingenious and shocking. Mark Ebner is a born storyteller who has seen it all, from the mean streets to Bel Air mansions."-- Robert Graysmith, author of Zodiac

"In Six Degrees of Paris Hilton, Mark Ebner lays bare the dark, twisted heart of a Hollywood so savage, so murderous, so unbelievably drugged-out, degenerate, sex-soaked, weird, and violent that only a journalist with Buick-sized balls and questionable sanity would even dare to go there. Most terrifying of all -- the story is true, and Ebner tells it with a ferocity and heart that will have readers panting and forgetting to wash or eat until they've clawed their way to the end. Forget all the glossy, big name, so-called Hollywood crime books you've ever read. After Six Degrees of Paris Hilton, they can torch the place and feed the ashes to rats. You'd have to go all the way back to In Cold Blood or Ellroy at his best to find a criminal saga any better than this. Let Ebner take you on a tour of shiny hell. You hold in your hands something very close to a masterpiece."-- Jerry Stahl, author of I, Fatty and Pain Killers

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

"Six Degrees of Paris Hilton is better than it needed to be for me to endorse it, it is better than you think it'll be--it is nothing short of an awesome book, and I highly recommend it."--Tucker Max, author of I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell

"If you want to discover more of the dark underbelly of L.A., where celebrities hang side-by-side with drug dealers and other criminals, Mark Ebner's upcoming book Six Degrees of Paris Hilton is for you."-- Rush & Molloy, New York Daily News

"For anyone who still thinks Hollywood is all glitz and glamour, author Mark Ebner has a wake-up call...Ebner's book masterfully exposes a Hollywood where It girls date drug dealers, industry players get beaten down for skipping out on gambling debts and celebrity sex tapes are a dime a dozen."-- ModernTonic.com, January 28, 2009

"This book is a celebrity-soaked bitches' brew bubbling over with toxic-shocked debutantes on a collision course with miscreants and the maladjusted...Ebner keeps writing the story as it rolls out in almost real time, chronicling duplicity and depravity with fierce insight and rich, meaty prose, discovering art thefts, fraud and a bottomless cesspool of shattered dreams and feckless, reckless abandon."-- Lisa Derrick, HuffingtonPost.com

"Six Degrees of Paris Hilton takes readers on a wild ride through the life of Darnell Riley -- murderer, extortionist and debt collector who worked his way into the social circle of the Hollywood heiress...It's an incredible story, and Ebner takes the reader on a whirlwind tour from the red carpet to the federal penitentiary."-- Marty Beckerman, The Daily Beast

"Part pit bull, part Columbo whacked out on a pot of espresso, they don't make investigative journalists like Mark Ebner anymore. Mr. Ebner is one of the few writers left today willing to get down in the gutter with his subjects just to hear their truth."-- Joseph Lindsey, Big Hollywood

"Hugely entertaining and terrifying. Ebner found the one untold story left in Hollywood."-- (former) New York Post Book Reviews Editor and journalist, William Georgiades

Product Description
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 exposé 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.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Simon Spotlight Entertainment; 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 (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (39 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #50,138 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 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

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!

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Hollywood true crime stories, March 27, 2009

By	Enrique Torres "Rico" (San Diegotitlan, Califas) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

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I must admit that I read this book because of the name Paris Hilton and all of the stories associated with her. What is it about being attracted to blonde young hotties? It must be a guy thing. I was not the least bit disappointed because there are many stories about Paris Hilton and much , much more. The "insights" into Paris Hilton is not really the jest of this book but as the title suggests, all the people around her. This is where the meat and strength of the book lies;that coupled with the creative, amusing and excellent writing skills of the author Mark Ebner. He has a knack for this type of investigative writing having written before for the National Enquirer. Back to the book though, in reallty this book is about the hangers on, the criminal element in particular, that seems to infiltrate and rub shoulders with the young "beautiful people" that are part of the Paris Hilton circle. Within this circle lurks the characters that dominate this book, most notably Will Wright and Darnell Riley. Also the book examines the lives of Rick Solomon and Girls Gone Wild video producer, Joe Francis. After reading this book I became aware of the intermingling of many unsavory characters in any number of criminal activites. The most interesting, from my perspective,is Darnell Riley who is the major player of this book. It is like his criminal biography in Hollywood. Apparently he was involved in any number of burglaries of the PH crews homes and is curently incarcerated for one of his burglaries where he tried to extort money from Joe Francis for a forced video he made during the burglary. Pretty nasty stuff to say the least. There are also many details about how the infamous "One night in Paris" came to make the rounds on the internet and elsewhere. The other focus of the book is Will Wright who is a character that is hard to believe even exists. I say this because he pulls off some major con coups within the PH circle of friends. He jet sets and mingles without any means of employment; his con game is his gateway to the stars. The stories told within this book are totally outrageous and almost beyond belief but they are true. I didn't know anything about these and other shady characters in this book until I read their unbelieveable exploits. I found the book pretty entertaining and rather amazing as I was unaware of all the goings on within the PH world of friends;it was almost exhausting. I think if you like true crime stories or tabloid Hollywood gossip that this book is for you. It is not for the faint of heart. I definitely would recommend this book. It is an enjoyable train wreck if you know what I mean.

7 of 8 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)

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!