Book Description

Las Vegas was a mob town built on restlessness and hunger, on glitter, greed, and the firm belief that anyone can get lucky once. But in the last decade Las Vegas has had its own change of fortune, transforming itself from a gambler's fun house to one of the country's top family vacation spots. Now Pete Earley--the investigative journalist and award-winning author who stormed Leavenworth in The Hot House--takes us inside today's colossal theme casinos, in a fascinating look at the life, death, and fantastic rebirth of the Las Vegas Strip. With 320 days of sunshine, 500 churches, 27 golf courses, and no state income tax, Las Vegas is the ultimate boomtown. And at the heart of the boom are the new "entertainment superstores" known as super casinos. How do they run? Who are the business titans responsible for these extravagant showplaces? And why was the gaudy Vegas of the Rat Pack era remade in the first place? Pete Earley traces this evolution by taking a probing look at the checkered history of Las Vegas--when moguls, mobsters, and the world's top entertainers came together to create this ultimate monument to American excess. This fascinating book reveals the real stories of well-known power brokers like Steve Wynn, Vegas legends like Howard Hughes and Bugsy Siegel, and the gripping rise and fall and rise again of the entrepreneurs behind one of the largest gaming corporations in the nation, the colossus Circus Circus, to which the author was given unique access. Earley's trademark you-are-there style brings us front and center as "whales" win and lose hundreds of thousands of dollars in a few seconds. We see grifters try every trick in the book to beat the odds--whileeye-in-the-sky cameras record all the action. We go behind the scenes to meet the blackjack dealers and hookers, the heavy hitters and bit players, the maids and chefs, security officers, cabbies, and showgirls who are caught up in the mercurial pace that pulses at the heart of this astounding city. This lively, probing book lays forth the real Las Vegas and shows how and why it has become the biggest draw in the country, offering adult and family entertainment like no other in the world. The result is an intriguing, often troubling look at a uniquely American city founded on greed--and a nation that built its own mad Mecca in the desert. This is the new Las Vegas--no longer the stomping ground of the Rat Pack, but just as fascinating, just as energized, just as cutthroat. What, and who, is behind it all? Earley was offered unique access to one of the largest gaming corporations in the nation (Circus Circus), and through his investigation of other major gambling enterprises, he shows how the Strip of yesterday has transformed itself, with multi-faceted, themed mega-complexes offering adult and family entertainment like no other in the world. Wall Street analysts call Las Vegas "the biggest cash cow in America"--its 1999 revenues were a staggering $27.2 billion. SUPER CASINO tells how it came to be the biggest draw in the country, while catching the voices of those large and small--bosses, shift managers, dealers, cashiers, showgirls, hookers, cabbies, tourists, and of course, the players--who make it run today. -->