Paper Trails: True Stories of Confusion, Mindless Violence, and Forbidden Desires, a Surprising Number of Which Are Not About Marriage
By Pete Dexter
4/5
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About this ebook
In the 1970s and '80s, before he earned national acclaim for his award-winning novels, Pete Dexter was a newspaper columnist. Every week, in a few hundred words, Dexter cut directly to the heart of the American character at a time of national turmoil and crucial change. With haunting urgency, his columns laid bare the violence, hypocrisy, and desperation he saw on the streets of Philadelphia and in the places he visited across the country. But he reveled, too, in the lighter side of his own life, sharing scenes with the indefatigable Mrs. Dexter, their young daughter, and a series of unforgettable creatures who strayed into their lives. No matter what caught Dexter's eye, it was illuminated by his dark, brilliant humor. Collected here are eighty-two of the best of those spellbinding, finely wrought pieces—with a new preface by the author—assembled by Rob Fleder, editor of the bestselling Sports Illustrated 50th Anniversary Book. Paper Trails is searing, heartbreaking, and irresistibly funny, sometimes all at once. As Pete Hamill says in his foreword, these essays "are as good as it ever gets."
Pete Dexter
Pete Dexter is the author of the National Book Award-winning novel Paris Trout and five other novels: God's Pocket, Deadwood, Brotherly Love, The Paperboy, and Train. He has been a columnist for the Philadelphia Daily News and the Sacramento Bee, and has contributed to many magazines, including Esquire, Sports Illustrated, and Playboy. His screenplays include Rush and Mulholland Falls. Dexter was born in Michigan and raised in Georgia, Illinois, and eastern South Dakota. He lives on an island off the coast of Washington. Rob Fleder was executive editor of Sports Illustrated and the editor of SI Books during his twenty years at Time Inc. He was the editor of Sports Illustrated 50th Anniversary Book, Sports Illustrated: The Baseball Book, Sports Illustrated: The Football Book, and Hate Mail from Cheerleaders, among other New York Times bestsellers.
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Reviews for Paper Trails
23 ratings4 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Years of fascinating introspective, humor, facts developed into engrossing stories about cities, the people who reside there, crime, home-life, animals who share our lives and so much compassion and depth. One sits in awe.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Tough. Terse. Decidedly macho. Also very engaging and well-written. I was surprised at how much I liked the content, despite my preconceived notions about how I dislike this style of writing. So I was wrong.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5This was a gift from someone who knew I was a journalist, and indeed it's a pretty cool thing to get when you're hoping to up your craft a little. Dexter was clearly one of the great columnists, and he has this really incredible use of the "in medias res" beginning, especially considering all but 5 of these columns never go past 2 and a half pages. In terms of the narrative applied to the factual, a lot to be learned from this guy, who can throw you into a shocking crime and an even more shocking prosecution, or get into the lives and heads of people he clearly only met on the street once randomly, or can just make you howl at one of his (though sometimes awful) comedy piece about his relationship with his wife (whoever she may be at the time).
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Really enjoyable compilation of newspaper articles by Pete Dexter. The last column really broke my heart.