To insure he’d finish his big, joyful and neon-lit first novel, “The Bonfire of the Vanities” (1987), he arranged for Rolling Stone to serialize it. Wolfe shadowed members of the Bronx homicide squad and lingered at the Manhattan criminal court. Norman Mailer read this and commented: “One has to applaud his moxie. Wolfe frequently mocked the follies of youth, yet his own prose did not seem to age at all. In a collection titled “Hooking Up” (2000) he delivered what can be read as his credo:“America is a wonderful country!

Source: New York Times May 15, 2018 20:57 UTC