(Paperback)

As father and son, John and Dan Fante's relationship was characterized by competition, resentment, rages, and extended periods of silence. This title traces Dan Fante's family's history from the hillsides of Italy to the immigrant neighborhoods of Colorado to Los Angeles.

A recovering alcoholic with a bad attitude and a mean streak, down-and-out ex-private investigator J. D. Fiorella, moving back home to Point Doom, California, gets back in the game when his only friend is brutally murdered by a serial killer with an axe to grind.