289 pp. Rubbing around the edges, pages browning around the edges. 'Richie and Cheech, pizza-faced Big Duck, Big Mickey and Little Mickey, Professor Kooba and the Arab--this is the group that gathers at the candy store to drink cream sodas and eat Mrs. Wagner's pies. The Magician presides, baffling all with prophecies and (occasionally inept) miracles. Together, these hapless slobs discuss illusion and reality, Kant and Better Davis, gripe about wives and baseball, debate the meaning of life, question if that really was the Pope handing out blessing in a San Francisco department store, and wonder if Dolores puts out. Gilbert Sorrentino has once again woven a magic tale, a candy-store burlesque, a Brooklyn Ulysses.' --Jacket blurb.