For years after Capote published In Cold Blood, he told everyone he was working on a masterpiece that would rival Proust's Remembrance of Things Past. It would be called Answered Prayers, and it would incorporate everything Capote knew about writing both fiction and nonfiction.

Unfortunately, though he thought about the work obsessively, he only wrote three chapters. Those chapters are what make up this book. And they leave you positively hungering for more. Answered Prayers is a roman a clef where the names have been changed, but certainly not to protect the innocent. I don't think there's an innocent character in this book. They're all obsessed with sex or money or power. And sometimes the name change is the only thing fictional about the character.

This book is a perfect companion read to Capote by Gerald Clarke because in it you get the facts that form the basis of the barely disguised fiction in this one.

This is a must read for fans of Capote. But it will leave you wishing he'd spent more time writing and less time boozing and pilling his way to the grave. ( )