Author of THE LAST DETAIL and CINDERELLA LIBERTY
Darryl Ponicsan's fictitious Andoshen, Pa., is 14 real miles from John O'Hara's fictitious Gibbsville, Pennsylvania.
In this novel, Ponicsan writes about his pocket of Lantenengo County as he remembers it from his boyhood. He asks his mother to fill in the gaps in his memory and to comment on how things have changed over the years. She volunteers much more information and her letters are reproduced throughout the book. They provide still another focus of the novel itself.
Ponicsan chronicles with precise economy the converging lives of the weird but lovable residents of Andoshen: the odd relationship between Shakey the Cop and Thunder Przwalski, town ne'er-do-well; the trouble between Ella Bistricky of Ella's Lunch and her brother-in-law, R.K., who took five years to get over Rita Hayworth; the love affair between Estelle Wowak. a wrapper-leaf stripper at the cigar factory, and the Reader; the exploits of Duncan, who once gave Willie Mosconi a good game; of Kayo Mackey, who was the only boy ever to hurt Gene Tunney; of Eggshell Oechsle, a primitive existentialist; of Stump Bonomo, Champion of the Tri-County Finger League; of Doc Rice, reluctant dentist; of Jake the Fake, Gyp the Blood, Lemonears Behind the Brewery, and the rest of the boys at Brolly's Bar and the Majestic Pocket Billiards.
Andoshen, Pa. is the touching story of a tough, often violent, coal town entirely undermined and sinking more rapidly than the jewel of the Adriatic. The poverty of Andoshen is as rich as that of Tortilla Flat or Cannery Row. It is a new and unique addition to the literary map of the world.
DARRYL PONICSAN brings to this novel the same curious, compassionate irony that made his other books, The Last Detail and Goldengrove, so highly acclaimed.
