{"title":"John Gregory Dunne","description":"\u003cp\u003eJohn Gregory Dunne's novels delve into the complexities of American life with sharp insight and incisive wit. His work often explores themes of ambition, human frailty, and the undercurrents of social change, set against vividly realised contemporary backdrops.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eVegas\u003c\/em\u003e exemplifies Dunne's ability to blend rich character studies with a keen sense of place, drawing readers into worlds that are both familiar and unsettling. Fans of compelling general fiction will appreciate his nuanced storytelling and atmospheric prose.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"vegas-by-john-gregory-dunne-9781961341326","title":"Vegas","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe best book about Sin City ever written... [Dunne's] grotesqueries aren't drug-induced, they're very real. His is the genuine Vegas.\u003c\/strong\u003e \u003cstrong\u003e\u003ci\u003eEsquire\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\"In the summer of my nervous breakdown, I went to live in Las Vegas, Clark County, Nevada.\" So begins John Gregory Dunne's neglected classic of first-person writing, a mordant, deadpan, grotesque tale that blurs the line between autobiography and fiction, confession and reportage.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003ePanicked by his own mortality, despondent over his many failings as a writer and a man, Dunne leaves his wife and their three-year-old child for the solitude of a crummy apartment off the Vegas Strip. There he plans to write an account of the city as he finds it; the book he ends up writing is \u003cem\u003ea fiction which recalls time both real and imagined\u003c\/em\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe remarkable central characters are Artha, a student at cosmetology college by day and a sex worker by night; Buster Mano, a private detective whose specialty is tracking down errant husbands; and Jackie Kasey, a lounge comic who opens for Elvis at $10,000 a night and wonders why he is still only a 'semi-name'. Pimps, bail bondsmen, parking-lot moguls, used-car tycoons, ex-jockeys, and women who look as if they had \"spent a lifetime meeting guys in Vegas or Miami Beach or Louisville for the Derby\": these are the people who wander through the lives of Artha, Buster, and Jackie and, for a dark season, the life of the narrator.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eJohn Gregory Dunne captures a low point in American culture and in one American life with rare vitality, honesty, and perception. Sad, powerful, wildly funny, \u003ci\u003eVegas\u003c\/i\u003e is like no memoir before or since.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Unknown","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47773220307180,"sku":"9781961341326","price":37.99,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/9781961341326-vegas.jpg?v=1782185804"}],"url":"https:\/\/bookhero.co.nz\/collections\/john-gregory-dunne.oembed","provider":"Book Hero","version":"1.0","type":"link"}