A fictional memoir that unpacks blood sport in the marketplace. The narrator finances many years of post-secondary education by taking summer jobs of dizzying variety. As he documents his experiences, he becomes porte-parole for a generation in the grips of precarious work. More broadly, however, he illuminates personalities of intriguing emotional and psychological complexity in circumstances that are obviously or discreetly desperate. These are dispatches from the front lines, stories that present an ironic and critical portrait of economic activity and human imperfections. Adversity and anguish burn in the atmosphere as do humor and heroism. The workplace is a dangerous environment to earn a living.
