- Paperback: 176 pages
- Publisher: Canongate Books Ltd (1 Sep 2001)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1841951900
- ISBN-13: 978-1841951904
- Product Dimensions: 20.8 x 13.5 x 1.5 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 135,282 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Spitting Off Tall Buildings
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £0.25
Get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade in Spitting Off Tall Buildings for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £0.25, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Product details |
More About the Author
Product Description
Product Description
Bruno Dante -- aspiring playwright, part-time depressive, and full-time drunk -- has hitchhiked cross-country, escaping the sunshine, have-a-nice-day culture of L.A. for the more cynical climate of New York. It seems to be his kind of town. But he's Bruno Dante, and things are always bound to go wrong.
He finds himself in the rut of deadbeat temping jobs, but they don't last. Dante won't play office politics or kiss ass. Longer stints as the night manager of a run-down hotel, a window cleaner, and, finally, a cabbie are punctuated by a number of meaningless affairs, drinking binges, and the customary bouts of depression.
Beautiful and brutal in equal measures, Fante's insights are once again fiercely compelling, desperately compassionate, and obscenely funny. Unmissable.
From the Back Cover
"Fante writes hard, emotive prose in which every word matters." The Face
"Fante writes like a screwed-up Chandler, living the life that most only ever write about." Morning Star
Spitting off Tall Buildings is the last episode in the Bruno Dante trilogy. This time Dante finds himself in New York, needing work. The type of work available to a man like Dante is rarely challenging or interesting. Work is more often just a battle to survive - a struggle with his inner demons before they screw things up for him. He tries his hand at countless jobs; movie theatre usher, hotel night manager, belt sales man, taxi driver and window cleaner of tall buildings amongst others. But nothing lasts, Dante is not a man who jells with bosses well.
This is the desperate plight of a man and his addiction. A man who uses alcohol to suppress the noises in his head, and who drinks to escape the wretchedness of his predicament, but whose drinking is jeopardising his one raison d'etre - his writing.
Dan Fante is the son of the late John Fante acclaimed writer of 1933 Was a Bad Year. Dan Fante drank for 20 years, married three times and worked in more dead-end jobs than he can remember. Now sober, he has written three novels, a play and a collection of poetry.
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Dan Fante was born to write. There are no wasted words, or false sentiments, in this abrasive, occasionally brutal 'memoir' (Fante harldy bothers to disguise the book's autobiographical basis). In Fante's universe, people are basically ignoble and self-interested, although our narrator has occasional lapses of extravagant generosity to those even less fortunate than himself. If you've ever done a dead-end job in a big city, this is a book should read. Once you've finished, you'll feel you've lived as well as read it.
Format:Paperback
Fante's third slice of Bruno Dante's life is typically raw and in your face. Just as brutal, funny, straight and true as his other two. Refreshing. Let's have some more from this guy!
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
14 reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful
A GREAT AMERICAN NOVEL!
29 Dec 2002
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Read it months ago and still can't get it out of my mind. This guy is better than Bukowski. If you don't believe me give it a shot.
What's it about? Trying to stay off booze and whatnot long enough to create on the typer--while desperately needing to hold on to some dead-end job in order to keep a bit of food in the belly and a roof overhead. This is life, the way it is for most people in this great nation of ours. Not everyone out there is wealthy like Bill Gates and has it made. Most people in this country are struggling and merely trying to make ends meet.
What's it about? Trying to stay off booze and whatnot long enough to create on the typer--while desperately needing to hold on to some dead-end job in order to keep a bit of food in the belly and a roof overhead. This is life, the way it is for most people in this great nation of ours. Not everyone out there is wealthy like Bill Gates and has it made. Most people in this country are struggling and merely trying to make ends meet.
Bruno Dante is one of us, one of many. He feels he has the ability and the talent to creat something he can be proud of as a writer...if he can keep the demons at bay long enough...
You don't have to be a writer to be able to relate.
A Great American Novel? That's exactly what I said.
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Bruno Dante's Way!
22 Sep 2002
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
The masterful Dan Fante, author of Spitting Off Tall Buildings, does it again. Easy to read, easy to relate. His protagonist Bruno Dante is a regular guy/struggling writer going from [bad] job to [bad] job in New York while at the same time hoping to create something worthwhile on the typewriter, etc., something he can be proud of... I like Fante as a human being, I like his "voice," and so will you. Unlike so many writers out there, he manages to stay clear of B.S. Life isn't easy for a lot of people; that's just the way things are and he lays it out. The style is pure, raw, from the heart and gut. The way it ought to be.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
How Does This Guy Do It?
28 Sep 2002
Format:Paperback
The title of this review pertains to Dan Fante the novelist, and to "Bruno Dante", Fante's protagonist in this third installment about an alcololic on a downward spiral. Dan Fante is a brilliant writer who takes the reader into the bowels of hell and back. How does he do it? "Bruno Dante" is a man on a road to nowhere and, like all alcoholics, refuses to admit it but somehow keeps on going. How does he do it?
"Bruno" started out as a chump (CHUMP CHANGE), then became a MOOCH and now he tries a geographical cure for his misery by moving to New York. In his first interview with a temp agency he lies about his last employer, telling the interviewer the company has relocated. "I've relocated, too" is his explanation for being in New York. Alcoholics are always trying to "relocate". Dead end job after dead end job follows until he finds himself hanging onto the side of a building, fourteen stories up, washing windows. The one satisfying moment of his day comes when he spits off a tall building knowing someone down below is lower than he. At least for that second.
Once again Fante explains the illness of addiction in a way everyone can understand. The booze and the drugs are only simptoms. It's the mind that's messed up. Yet "Bruno" will continue to seek happiness in a place where happiness never has been and never will be found: in that messed up mind of his.
You'll find yourself pulling for "Bruno" to find that happiness because, even though he's a full blown alcoholic, Fante has made him a very funny and likeable guy. Will he find that happiness we all seek? Read the book to find out.
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
