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Loading... A Guide to Recognizing Your Saintsby Dito Montiel
None. Reminiscent of the beats, and very enjoyable. The story of the author's upbringing in Queens back in the 80's, when Astoria was still a rough-and-tumble narrative. Robert Downey Jr. stars in the film version. (  ) alissamarie | Oct 25, 2009 |  Reminiscent of the beats, and very enjoyable. The story of the author's upbringing in Queens back in the 80's, when Astoria was still a rough-and-tumble narrative. Robert Downey Jr. stars in the film version. ( ) alissamarie | Oct 25, 2009 | Reminiscent of the beats, and very enjoyable. The story of the author's upbringing in Queens back in the 80's, when Astoria was still a rough-and-tumble narrative. Robert Downey Jr. stars in the film version. ( ) alissamarie | Oct 25, 2009 | I read this almost in one sitting. It's entertaining. Caught myself rolling my eyes a few times at the hyperbolic descriptions of wild times - had Montiel toned it down a bit, the credibility would have been stronger for me. That being said -- I believe nearly every word of this memoir, based on the context of the time. Some lives are just that incredible. I just found the "extreme wildness" angle distracting, comparing it in my mind to descriptive writers who have had longer periods of consistent wildness, and yet don't seem to get so "in-your-face" about it. What I liked best was the way Montiel's love for New York shows itself in his prose, and the spiritual nature he brings into his observations of events. There is also a refreshing lack of negativity in his storytelling. ( ) kallos | Sep 9, 2008 | It was an alright book. nothing too special about it. I really liked how he talked about New York and how it was his city but the rest of the book was all over the place. It was definately not a quick read and I almost forced myself to sit there and read it. I would probably not recommend this book to that many people. 8sm01gro | Apr 25, 2008 | no reviews | add a review
Amazon.com Product Description (ISBN 0786167939, Audio CD)“As far back as i can remember ... i can remember manhattan.” Orlandito “Dito” Montiel, son of Orlando, a Nicaraguan immigrant and an Irish mother, grew wild in the streets of Astoria, Queens, pulling pranks for Greek and Italian gangsters and confessing at the Church of the Immaculate Conception, gobbling hits of purple mescaline and Old English, sneaking into Times Square whore houses—“Kids from nowhere going nowhere.” At fourteen, Dito watched as his best friend and surrogate older brother, Antonio, beat another kid to death with a baseball bat during a gang fight.A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints is the quintessentially American story of a young man’s hunger for experience, of his dawning awareness of the bigger world across the bridge, and of the loyalties that bind him to a violent past and to the flawed and desperate “Saints” that have guided him—a streetwise Meetings with Remarkable Men with echoes of Whitman and Kerouac, Saturday Night Fever, and Dion and the Belmonts. (retrieved from Amazon Thu, 14 Feb 2013 13:42:47 -0500) A coming-of-age story about a boy growing up in Astoria, N.Y., during the 1980s. As his friends end up dead, on drugs or in prison, he comes to believe he has been saved from their fate by various so-called saints. He goes back home after fifteen years when he finds out that his father is ill. There he finds old friends, lost friends, and new relationships as he comes to term with his father's rage and love.… (more) |
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