<p> Low-life writer and unrepentant alcoholic Henry Chinaski was born to survive. After decades of slacking off at low-paying dead-end jobs, blowing his cash on booze and women, and scrimping by in flea-bitten apartments, Chinaski sees his poetic star rising at last. Now, at fifty, he is reveling in his sudden rock-star life, running three hundred hangovers a year, and maintaining a sex life that would cripple Casanova. </p> <p> With all of Bukowski's trademark humor and gritty, dark honesty, this 1978 follow-up to <i>Post Office</i> and <i>Factotum</i> is an uncompromising account of life on the edge. </p>