cover image My Life on the Street

My Life on the Street

Joe Homeless. New Horizon Press, $19.95 (200pp) ISBN 978-0-88282-102-3

What is one to make of this bleary odyssey that careens around the streets of New York City? What is true and what is not? The author, whoever he is, speaks of packs of feral block associations wielding bats and pipes hunting him down like a mad dog. Feverish fantasy? This horrible story--gritty, sometimes bloody and probably true to life in many respects--shows Joe Homeless shuttling between relatives, friends, churches, hospitals and shelters. But where does reality begin and end? At the end we see the author camped in a subway station, having been interviewed by the press and awaiting word from his agent on his manuscript. Did his advance get him off the streets? He needs help, and so does this memoir, which provides no introduction or epilogue for context. (Apr.)