This volume assembles for the first time a staggering multiplicity of reflections and readings of John Fante's 1939 classic, Ask the Dust, a true testament to the work's present and future impact. Charting the trajectory of one Arturo Bandini over the multiethnic terrain of Los Angeles, ambition and bravado soar, crash, and burn in Fante's signature novel in ways that resonate profoundly some eighty years after Stackpole Press's first edition entered the world. As our attention is increasingly drawn to the West Coast as the bellwether of new beginnings and bold starts, Arturo Bandini's ranting and roving through a dry, dusty L.A. kicks up a windswept nostalgia whose grit settles in the soul and stays. Bandini's testy love for the Mexican Camilla Lopez, whose own tough and tender persona runs counterpoint to his own, is explored for all of its gendered, ethnic, sociological, and economic potential in the essays and documents that make up this volume. The contributors to this work-writers, critics, fans, scholars, screenwriters, and directors-analyze the provocative set of diaspora tensions in Fante's masterpiece that distinguish it from those recounting earlier, East Coast migrations and minglings. A must-read for aficionados of L.A. fiction and new migration literature, John Fante's 'Ask the Dust': A Joining of Voices and Views, is destined for landmark status as the first volume of Fante studies to reveal the novel's evolving intertextualities and intersectionalities. Fans, scholars, and critics alike will delight in the diversity of praise and opinions that Fante's masterpiece has sparked in a global readership whose enthusiasm knows no bounds. While Arturo Bandini may be celebrating his eightieth birthday in print, there is no doubt that this collection of essays launches Fante's hero into his next eighty years, and beyond.
