Dan Fante lived the stories he wrote. His voice has the immediacy of a stranger of the next barstool, of a friend who lives on the edge. As he writes in (the title is street slang for a half-pint of alcohol): Fante was the son of famed novelist and screenwriter John Fante, but as the wrote, the younger Fante “… allows us a glimpse of the Southern California demimonde that surely escaped his father’s attention.” These outsider stories are raw, vivid, and brutally honest. But even when the stories are fueled by anger and disgust, they are punctuated by unexpectedly funny and dark-humored vignettes. is for readers ready for a cab ride on the wild side.