God Bless America — Mark Safranko

"'You got the worst luck in the world, punk -- always in the wrong place at the wrong time!' Bash was yelling at me when she brought me home from the emergency room. Here I was, causing trouble again. Somehow, no matter what I was up to, I always managed to step into it...." Max Zajack's childhood years are far from the best of his life. Thrown into a world of a tempestuous immigrant family and a controlling Catholic school, Max sees only two means of escape...death or madness. Max spirals down through psychotic teachers, wild arguments, lousy jobs, fear and blood. How can anyone survive? Well, maybe in realising the bleak humour of the whole damned thing.... After success in Europe with his first two novels Hating Olivia and Lounge Lizard, Mark SaFranko returns with a third Max Zajack novel. As a confessional childhood novel, God Bless America has drawn favourable comparisons to Harry Crews (A Childhood), John Fante (1933 Was A Bad Year, The Road To Los Angeles) and Charles Bukowski (Ham On Rye).