Jane's review
Ask the Dust (P.S.) by John Fante
My california friend Amelia told me to read this; I took it from her house, and she'd made little notes in it so anyone who borrows it would get the L.A. insider references.
I enjoyed reading it; it is a very fast read and fun - and you can tell that he was one of Bukowski's big influences (aside from the fact that Bukowski wrote the intro to the version i read). As a warning it is a book about writing - kind of autobiographical - but its approach has a sweetness to it - or maybe I just felt a maternal twang towards the narrator. It is a very American tale. A twenty-year-old Coloradan, Arturo Bandini, has transplanted himself to L.A. to try to be writer in the bygone era when coffee cost 5 cents a cup. He is a loner who tells wild tales of his experiences, subsisting off oranges stashed under the bed in his cheap hotel room, and writing long romantic letters to his beloved Hackmuth, the man who published his one short story: "The Little Dog Laughed," which is apparentl...more
I enjoyed reading it; it is a very fast read and fun - and you can tell that he was one of Bukowski's big influences (aside from the fact that Bukowski wrote the intro to the version i read). As a warning it is a book about writing - kind of autobiographical - but its approach has a sweetness to it - or maybe I just felt a maternal twang towards the narrator. It is a very American tale. A twenty-year-old Coloradan, Arturo Bandini, has transplanted himself to L.A. to try to be writer in the bygone era when coffee cost 5 cents a cup. He is a loner who tells wild tales of his experiences, subsisting off oranges stashed under the bed in his cheap hotel room, and writing long romantic letters to his beloved Hackmuth, the man who published his one short story: "The Little Dog Laughed," which is apparentl...more
