The Idolmaker takes an incisive look at the machinations behind the music business. It's also a loving remembrance of the early days of rock 'n' roll and an honest, thrilling story of what success is about.

Wallace Ritchie, an American vacationer in London, doesn't know that the bullets are real and the truth serum true. He thinks the intrigue erupting around him is part of an audience-participation theater event. Yet, the world's fate depends on this gullible goofus who can't even spell CIA.

"High school is over. Time to move on. But events conspire to reunite Ryan, Seth and Summer in posh, seaside Newport. And there may even be a new Core Four. Because after Taylor Townsend says a quick if not passionate au revoir to her education in France, she just might pursue Ryan until he catches her. Time, too, for the series to move on with these 16 Final Episodes. Seth marries Summer? (Maybe.) Ryan goes through life like it's a steel-cage brawl?...

When Ryan Atwood, a tough, guarded, fiercely intelligent 16-year-old plunges headlong into the wealthy community of Newport Beach, he soon discovers that the ruling families of Orange County are every bit as territorial as the tough crowd with which he ran on the streets of Chino. For Sandy Cohen, the idealistic public defender who takes Ryan in; his wife Kirsten, the linchpin of O.C. society; their awkward adolescent son, Seth; and the beautiful...