Winner Takes All or Websters New World Letter Writing Handbook

Winner Takes All: Steve Wynn, Kirk Kerkorian, Gary Loveman, and the Race to Own Las Vegas

Author: Christina Binkley

Sin City. Bright lights, high stakes, and no sleep. Home to some of the world's grandest, flashiest, and most lucrative casino resorts, Las Vegas, with its multitude of attractions, draws some forty million tourists from around the world every year. But Vegas hasn't always been booming at the level it is today. This newest influx is largely a result of three competing business moguls. Meet Kirk Kerkorian, Steve Wynn, and Dr. Gary Loveman, men who couldn't be more different from one another, yet share the same tunnel-vision determination to conquer the city that feeds the world's fantasies.

No longer just a go-to city for gambling, as a result of Kerkorian, Wynn, and Loveman working to reach the top-and to top one another-Las Vegas is now home to restaurants run by some of the world's top chefs, some of Hollywood's biggest stars headlining their own venues, galleries featuring some of the world's most valuable art, and meta-resorts boasting the largest and most expansive casinos, spas, and more.

Having had personal access to these men, Wall Street Journal reporter Christina Binkley gives us a never-before-seen, up-close look at the trio of tycoons whose high-stakes gambles have made Sin City soar. Sharp, insightful, and revealing, this is the gripping story of how billions of dollars and the unparalleled drive for power made the personal visions of three moguls evolve from dreams to larger-than-life reality.

The Washington Post - Jonathan Krim

…[an] important and detailed account…Binkley vividly conveys the repulsiveness of the scene, but as with train wrecks, you just can't stop looking. Or reading.

Publishers Weekly

Former Wall Street Journalreporter Binkley offers this story of the "trio of tycoons" who took over Las Vegas and transformed it from a "crushed-velvet world" with a "libidinous frontier air" into a place where, increasingly and sometimes surprisingly, "entertainment and good taste go hand in hand." Binkley provides an inside look at deal-maker Kerkorian, casino visionary Wynn and professor-turned-mogul Loveman and their lavishly competitive lives: their exclusive and "aggressive" tennis games, the one-way conveyor belt created to transport customers away from a competing casino, the battle to build the biggest and the best. The author shares intriguing details about these power players-Wynn has a secret entrance, behind some fake books on a shelf, to a sprawling closet-and is also adept at portraying a seedier Vegas, where aged Mafia barons dined "on the osso buco at Piero's Italian restaurant, their canes hanging from their chairs." Sometimes her chronology gets a little murky. Still, Binkley offers plenty of nuggets mined from her years on the beat, producing a full, flashy tale of powerful men and their pride, vanity, envy, greed-and all the other cardinal no-nos that earned Vegas the name "Sin City." (Mar.)

Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information

Library Journal

What is it about Las Vegas that draws millions of people each year willing to spend billions of dollars? In her first book Wall Street Journal columnist Binkley tries to explain the city's allure by focusing on three of its more successful casino tycoons, all of whom she believes to be responsible for Las Vegas's transformation from a gaudy gambling town into a gigantic theme park. These men themselves could have made a pretty amazing story (she had personal access to all three), but Binkley chooses instead to devote the majority of the book to chronicling how the new generation of casinos was designed and built, which unfortunately makes for rather lackluster reading. In one of the more insightful sections, she does divulge how these casinos actually make their money, revealing that "casinos do not gamble-the odds are always fixed on their side." Ultimately, the appeal of the "sin capital of the U.S." is neither about art nor culture, but simply fantasy. As Binkley observes, "people don't come to Las Vegas for good taste." Suitable for larger public libraries.-Richard Drezen, Washington Post , NYC Bureau

Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

Las Vegas, and how it got that way. Wall Street Journal columnist Binkley focuses on the three visionaries-dissimilar in temperament, sensibility and manner-who have returned the luster and glamour to Sin City after its benighted tenure as a tacky family vacation spot. Casino magnate Steve Wynn (the Mirage, the Bellagio) receives the lion's share of the attention-and for good reason. Charismatic, voluble, driven and, tragically, slowly going blind, Wynn assumes the dimensions of a tragic Shakespearean king, obsessively building overwhelmingly deluxe pleasure palaces filled with fine art and world-class entertainment, spas and restaurants in an orgy of hubris and overspending. His nemesis, Kirk Kerkorian (MGM Grand), is in every way his opposite: a fastidious, self-effacing operator who lives for the killer deal and brokers multibillion-dollar transactions well into his 80s. Finally there is Gary Loveman, a clean-living former economics professor who revolutionized the gaming industry with impossibly complex consumer behavior-predicting formulas targeting low-rollers, sending the revenues for the down-market Harrah's chain into the stratosphere. The most interesting bits come when things go wrong: The sad story of the misguided attempt to open a modern, ultra-luxe supercasino in Mississippi is, as rendered by Binkley, a small comic classic of class confusion and cultural misunderstanding, rich in schadenfreude. The author has a novelist's instinct for character development and taut, suspenseful storytelling, infusing the subject with all of the drama, verve and what-happens-next imperative of a classic Scorsese epic. It's a quintessentially American story, full of money, ego, competition,vice and the stubborn belief that transcendence is just around the next corner, waiting for someone with the vision and guts to grab it. As exhilarating as a high-stakes game of craps.

What People Are Saying

Po Bronson
"It's a great drama on the greatest stage. . . . Wynn, Kerkorian, and Loveman represent three opposing business personalities, three styles of achieving success. On the Vegas Strip, they're pitted against one another like gladiators, and we've got front-row seats. Kapow!"--(Po Bronson, author of WHAT SHOULD I DO WITH MY LIFE?)

Books about: Art and Rosies Home Tested Recipes or Bread

Webster's New World Letter Writing Handbook

Author: Robert W Bly

Expert tips and 300 sample letters make business and personal correspondence a snap.
When trying to close a sale, answer a complaint, or offer thanks, a well-crafted letter can make all the difference. Packed with practical advice and 300 easy-to-adapt sample letters, this all-purpose guide shows readers how to write letters that get results -at work and at home.
Covering the nuts-and-bolts of letter writing as well as the secrets of high-impact prose, the book delivers proven recipes for attention-grabbing introductions, persuasive arguments, memorable phrases, and closing clinchers. Best of all, it offers guidance on business and personal letters for every circumstance, from job hunting, selling, fundraising, and asking favors to giving a reprimand, responding to criticism, expressing sympathy, and declining gracefully. It's the only reference anyone will ever need to write the perfect letter, whatever the occasion.

Table of Contents:

	Introduction	1
Pt. I	Letter Writing Basics	3
Pt. II	Personal Correspondence	33
Pt. III	Career and Employment Letters	71
Pt. IV	General Business Correspondence	117
Pt. V	Internal Communication	189
Pt. VI	Customer Service Correspondence	243
Pt. VII	Sales and Marketing Letters	317
Pt. VIII	Credit, Collection, and Billing	393
Pt. IX	Vendor Communications	437
Pt. X	E-Mail and Fax Correspondence	495
	Appendix A: Formats	517
	Appendix B: Useful Letter Writing Aids	529
	Appendix C: Mailing and Shipping	559
	Glossary	561
	Index	567