Famous Potatoes
Narrated Drama Series
Willy Middlebrook is a nice boy from the suburbs, a Vietnam vet, a college drop-out majoring in Human Kindness. Framed for the murder of a cop, Willy goes on the lam from the law. With hopeful heart and broken balls he lives among the people of the humble cafes and dusty bars, underground: “They have rough brown skin and wrinkled eyes. They are round and they are usually dirty. They are hard because they have to be, but if you warm them they get soft and you can make them sweet.” Famous Potatoes is a road novel with a touch of noir, a tall tale that has been called “exuberant, funny, and humane.”
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The year is 1973. Back in those days only bad people got tattoos; long distance calls cost a small fortune; and an IBM 360 computer with a few hundred kilobytes was enough to run a bank.
[…]
As a young man, Joe Cottonwood used to hitchhike everywhere. Many of the encounters in Famous Potatoes are based on actual events from those times.
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This podcast is rated deep R for bad language and occasional scenes of funky sex. And a lot of joy.
Author's note: I wrote this novel forty years ago as a cockeyed love letter to the USA. I was a young man without children. Now I am a grandfather. A few of the passages, as I review them now, could make a grandfather blush. Nevertheless I have resisted the impulse to censor any youthful excess. I've also let stand the passages that would now be deemed Politically Incorrect. They are an accurate rendition of the times (1973).
[…]
The year is 1973. Back in those days only bad people got tattoos; long distance calls cost a small fortune; and an IBM 360 computer with a few hundred kilobytes was enough to run a bank.
[…]
As a young man, Joe Cottonwood used to hitchhike everywhere. Many of the encounters in Famous Potatoes are based on actual events from those times.
[…]
This podcast is rated deep R for bad language and occasional scenes of funky sex. And a lot of joy.
Author's note: I wrote this novel forty years ago as a cockeyed love letter to the USA. I was a young man without children. Now I am a grandfather. A few of the passages, as I review them now, could make a grandfather blush. Nevertheless I have resisted the impulse to censor any youthful excess. I've also let stand the passages that would now be deemed Politically Incorrect. They are an accurate rendition of the times (1973).
Mature
