With the deftness of skill inherent in the the works of Steinbeck and Kerouac, Steven Charnow soulfully paints memorable characters against the backdrop of the late nineteen-fifties in Carnasie and Jamaica Bay in Brooklyn. Charnow's descriptive powers continuously transform flat written words into realistic and detailed visuals of characters such as Leo: "Leo was a small man, five foot-three in his stocking feet. He rarely used the cash register, preferring to make change from the coins bulging in the side pocket of the fraying, gray jacket he wore all year. A fringe of white hair circled his head. Thick eyebrows and drooping eyelids gave him a look of perpetual fatigue."...and of landscape details: "The path, overgrown with chokeberry brought me to the ruined pavilion. A trellis over the bandstand had collapsed. Strings of lights sagged above the boards of the dance floor. Field mice darted in an out of the debris..." Most important in CHARLIE FIG AND THE LIP Charnow's main characters, Charlie Figatelli and Aaron Lipstein, are two unlikely and unalike friends readers cannot help but love and care about. Kudos, Mr. Charnow, I await the next edition gliding artfully from mind and imagination to the page.