Drafted two months before Jack Kerouac began is the first and most accurate chronicle of the private lives lived by the Beats before they became public figures. In honest, lucid fictional prose designed to capture the events, emotions, and essence of his experience among the Beats, Holmes describes an individualistic post-World War II New York where crime is celebrated, writing is revered, and parties, booze, discussions, drugs, and sex punctuate life. The most tentative and conservative of the Beats, Holmes's intelligent and sensitive voice also details the pressures and regrets that his lifestyle gave birth to. With portraits of Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, Neil Cassady, William Burroughs, this first novel about the Beat Generation gives us a peek into what it meant to be a Beat before the term had ever been used. "... still one of the best novels about the Beat Generation . . . brilliant and important." — "I want to write to you about ... your book. You did the honest thing, the big thing, the good thing." — Jack Kerouac " signaled the start of something new in American literature. A generation with a new consciousness had found its voice . . . " — Ann Charters