Now and Then: From Coney Island to Here

From the author of two of our most legendary novels Catch-22 and SomethingHappened comes a slyly funny vastly revelatory memoir that is at once a lovingevocation of a lost America and an exploration of the frontier where life turnsinto literature.. Now and Then follows Joseph Heller from his fatherless childhood on theboardwalks of Depression-era Coney Island where he grew up amid the rumble ofthe Cyclone and the tantalizing aroma of Mrs. Shatzkins knishes. It offers adizzying bombardiers-eye view of the sky over wartime Italy where Hellerencountered the characters and incidents he would later translate into Catch-22.It depicts a writer coming to terms with both rejection and celebrity. Here inshort is a life filled with incident and insight recollected with  subversivehumor exquisite timing and a fine appreciation for the absurd.