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Seven Stories Press

Works of Radical Imagination

Book cover for Citizen Newhouse
Book cover for Citizen NewhouseBook cover for Citizen NewhouseBook cover for Citizen Newhouse

Citizen Newhouse: Portrait of a Media Merchant is a hard-hitting exposé of the inner workings of a media empire, from its early days at the Staten Island Advance to his latest shake-up at the New Yorker.

In this unauthorized investigative biography, Carol Felsenthal paints an intriguing portrait of Si Newhouse and his family dynasty by revealing machinations of these atypically elusive media moguls within the high-stakes world of today’s entertainment conglomerates.

The book opens in the manner of a classic American family saga, with Si’s father, Sam Newhouse, who quit school after the eighth grade, as paterfamilias.Having concocted a formula for creating newspaper monopolies in small metropolitan markets, he built the huge family fortune. Si took over the magazine portion of the vast empire, while his brother, Donald, managed the family’s newspaper and cable television holdings.

Citizen Newhouse, which gives the scoop on the sale of Random House and the dramatic changes at the New Yorker, is a fascinating account of powerful and glamorous lives—and their impact on the newspapers and magazines we read today.

Book cover for Citizen Newhouse
Book cover for Citizen NewhouseBook cover for Citizen NewhouseBook cover for Citizen Newhouse

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Praise for Carol Felsenthal: ""Carol Felsenthal tells the inside story . . . with exceptional verve and dilligence . . . . [A] gripping story.”

Praise for Carol Felsenthal: "Felsenthal lays out facts in a riveting style.”

Praise for Carol Felsenthal: "[Felsenthal] does a great job of conjuring up . . . characters in all their complexity.”

Carol Felsenthal

CAROL FELSENTHAL is the author of several acclaimed biographies, including Citizen Newhouse: Portrait of a Media Merchant, Princess Alice: The Life and Times of Alice Roosevelt Longworth, Power, Privilege and the Post: The Katharine Graham Story, and The Sweetheart of the Silent Majority: The Biography of Phyllis Schlafly. Felsenthal received her BA from the University of Illinois at Urbana and her MA from Boston College. A native of Chicago, she lives there with her husband and three children.