Books by Edward Bunker

When Earl Copen, a veteran of San Quentin, takes it upon himself to instruct newcomer Ron Decker in the details of prison protocol, a bond like that between father and son develops between the two men. Reprint. 15,000 first printing. (A new film, directed by Steve Buscemi, starring Willem Dafoe) (General Fiction)

In Education of a Felon, the reigning champion of prison novelists finally tells his own story. The son of an alcoholic stagehand father and a Busby Berkley chorus girl, Bunker was--at seventeen--the youngest inmate ever in St. Quentin. His hard-won experiences on L.A.'s meanest streets and in and out of prison gave him the material to write some of the grittiest and most affecting novels of our time.

From smoking a joint in the gas chamber to leaving fingerprints on a knife connected to a serial killer, from Hollywood's seamy underside to swimming in the Neptune pool at San Simeon, Bunker delivers a memoir as colorful as any of his novels and as compelling as the life he led.

Here is the quintessential story of a young hoodlum's coming of age, from the undisputed master of the genre. Alex Hamilton is young, intelligent, savvy, and independent--but also subject to violent fits of rage. Raised within the confines of a system that has done nothing but provide him with pain, his frustration and anger are completely natural--and inherently dangerous. Rebellious since his parents split up, Alex is constantly running from foster homes and institutions, yearning to be with his father, a broken man who cannot give his son the home he desperately needs. As Alex is pulled between well-meaning but exhausted social workers and viciously cruel authority figures, his emotions and actions are forever careening off these two disparate influences. Only one constant remains: his no-good, criminal-minded peers, who are all too ready to plant illegal ideas in a young, bright mind that's already well on its way to social deviancy. LITTLE BOY BLUE vividly documents this destruction, allowing the reader to sift through the wreckage of a childhood gone terribly awry.

After serving an eight-year term in Folsom State Prison, Max Dembo is determined not to return to his former way of life, in a realistic, suspenseful study of the pressures facing ex-convicts as they attempt to negotiate the straight world. Reissue.