Ask the Dust
John Fante
Arturo Bandini is a twenty-year-old burgeoning writer, spending his days hungry for success, life and food in a dingy hotel in Los Angeles. Full of the enthusiasm of youth, and the thrill of having one short story published, the reality of poverty and prejudice has hit him hard. He meets a local waitress, Camilla Lopez, who hopes to rise above her lot in life by marrying a wealthy American. Bandini and Camilla embark on a strange love-hate relationship. Slowly, but inexorably, it descends into the realms of madness.
This is the novel that Charles Bukowski described as ‘A wild and enormous miracle’. In fact, Bukowski credits Fante’s novel as the reason he himself became a writer.
Praise for Ask the Dust:
‘An important and an intermittently beautiful novel.’
Herald
‘Bandini is a magnificent creation.’
Times Literary Supplement
‘One of the premier American writers of the century…People who remember the LA of the 30s say Ask the Dust captures the city and its textures like no book before or since.’
Vogue
‘John Fante is one of the lost souls of American letters, an author whose worth has an almost legendary status among writers and critics.’
LA Times
‘Today’s reader is the true beneficiary of John Fante’s hard-nosed, defiant resolve to follow his dream to write: it’s too bad he died before the plaudits started coming.’
The Times
