Books by Frank Rose

“Neuroscientists tell us and politicians . . . well know how much more convincing a good story can be than an account that’s based on data. A good reason to learn more about the brain mechanisms that are activated by stories and the tricks that storytellers use, both of which are revealed.”

— Corriere della Sera (Milan)

BUILDING ON INSIGHTS from cognitive psychology and neuroscience, ‘The Sea We Swim In’ shows us how to see the world in narrative terms, not as a thesis to be argued or a pitch to be made but as a story to be told. This is the essence of narrative thinking. Learn more about The Sea We Swim In …

“Compelling . . . From ‘Star Wars’ to ‘Lost’ (‘television for the hive mind’), it is the immersive, ‘fractal-like com­plexity’ of story­telling that turns on digital audiences and sends them online to extend the fantasy via wikis, Twitter and blogs.”

— P.D. James, The Guardian (London)

NOT LONG AGO WE WERE passive consumers of mass media. Now we approach television, movies, even advertising as invitations to participate. We are witnessing the emergence of a new form of narrative that is native to the In­ternet. Learn more about The Art of Immersion …

“A must-read for anyone who wants to understand both the general thrust of Hollywood innovation and the general influence of agents behind that innovation, starting in 1898 when William Morris opened shop.”

— WME partner Bradley Singer in Business Insider

FOR DECADES, the Morris agency made deals that determined the fate of stars, studios, and television networks alike. But everything changed after the agency’s president dismissed his own best friend, the man who’d brought Barry Diller and Michael Ovitz out of the mailroom. A multi-generational saga of loyalty and betrayal in Hollywood. Learn more about The Agency …

“Rose’s tone is authoritative and wry. . . . His smooth and lively story captures better than any previous attempt the spirit of Apple under Jobs. . . . Of them all, ‘West of Eden’ seems most likely to endure as the definitive account of the convulsive period that saw Apple grow up.”

— Businessweek

IT SEEMS UNTHINKABLE TODAY—but forty years ago, when personal com­puters were still new and the World Wide Web had yet to be invented, Steve Jobs was cast out of Apple. And it wasn’t just Wall Street that applauded—it was most of Silicon Valley. Learn ore about West of Eden …

“A good, acces­sible re­port for the gen­eral reader on one of the most bizarre fas­cina­tions of mod­ern sci­ence.”

— Theo­dore Roszak, San Fran­cis­co Chron­icle

IN A CRAMPED LABORATORY in the Berkeley engineering school, scientists are trying to teach a computer to think—not just to shuffle data but to learn, reason, remember, understand English, and exhibit common sense. But first they have to get it to put on a raincoat before going out in the rain. Learn more about Into the Heart of the Mind …

“If ‘Real Men’ is an accurate survey of the current state of masculinity in America, then it’s doing just fine, thank you, without John Wayne. But even if ‘Real Men’ isn’t a representative sampling (and it doesn’t pretend to be), it’s valuable as a series of vivid, meticulous portraits—sharply written, insightfully photographed, enthralling as no myth can ever be but reality always is.”

— The Village Voice

THIS IS A BOOK ABOUT BEING MALE. About power and discipline, sex and violence, and the roles they play in the lives of American men. Think of it as a personal and idiosyncratic survey designed to produce not statistical data but individual answers to the question of what it means to be a man. Learn more about Real Men…