John Fante - 1933 Foi Um Mau Ano

One year away from finishing high school, Dominic Molise can't wait to leave his family home, dominated by his father, a bricklayer prone to extramarital affairs, and his devout mother, who swears she sees the Virgin Mary in the backyard chicken coop.

Dominic dreams of being a baseball star, blessed with great victories, public recognition, and a great love. But instead, he's stuck in a small town torn apart by poverty, in a family where all that's expected is that their children follow in the footsteps of their parents and grandparents. If his ambition to play baseball seems increasingly distant, matters of the heart aren't going his way either.

The story of a young man torn between tradition and freedom, between family and self-determination, in a society parched by a devastating economic crisis. The story of an individual's struggle, embodying the struggle of an entire class during the Great Depression of the 1930s. A comic and moving novel about youth and its dissolution into adulthood.