The debut novel from Akashic’s new imprint, Punk Planet Books. Also check out the smash hits  How the Hula Girl Sings ,  Tender as Hellfire , and  The Boy Detective Fails . “A funny, hard-rocking first-person tale of teenage angst and discovery.” ― Booklist “Captures the loose, fun, recklessness of midwestern punk.” ― MTV.com Hairstyles of the Damned  is an honest, true-life depiction of growing up punk on Chicago’s south side: a study in the demons of racial intolerance, Catholic school conformism, and class repression. It is the story of the riotous exploits of Brian, a high school burnout, and his best friend, Gretchen, a punk rock girl fond of brawling. Based on the actual events surrounding a Chicago high school’s segregated prom, this work of fiction unflinchingly pursues the truth in discovering what it means to be your own person. Adult/High School - Set in Chicago's South Side in the early 1990s, this novel follows a year in the life of high school student Brian Oswald. His friend Gretchen, a heavyset, fight-provoking, punk-music fan, travels with him through the adolescent world of shopping malls, music stores, and suburban streets. And Brian is madly in love with her. Unfortunately, Gretchen loves Tony, a 20-something white-power hooligan who hangs out in arcades to pick up impressionable high school girls. Brian spends the first half of the book trying to build up enough courage to ask Gretchen out. When he makes his feelings known, their relationship is severed. For a time, he moves on and away from her. Trouble between his parents and issues of peer pressure flesh out the skeleton of this work. Written as a first-person narrative, the novel brings Brian to life by making full use of those colorful expletives and sexual jokes that high school boys love so much. The teen is not a nerd or a jock, but lives in a space between those stereotypes. Yet he struggles desperately to find his niche, circulating from cliques as diverse as the D&D geeks to the hyper-violent skinheads. Meno plays with music in a fashion reminiscent of Nick Hornby's High Fidelity (Penguin, 1996). The story winds its way back to Gretchen, who inadvertently leads Brian to realize that punk, too, is its own form of a fabricated identity. In the end he learns that he is Brian Oswald - and he's okay with that. - Matthew L. Moffett, Northern Virginia Community College, Annandale Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Meno's third novel is a funny, hard-rocking first-person tale of teenage angst and discovery. Brian, a reluctant junior in a Catholic high school on the Far South Side of Chicago, and his best friend, Gretchen, with whom he is falling in love, and who outweighs him and is way tougher and hipper (she has dyed her hair pink), spend a lot of time driving around and listening to music. It's 1990, Gretchen's mother is dead, Brian's folks are estranged, and punk rock is their gospel. After writing about a 10-year-old in Tender as Hellfire (1999) and an ex-con in How the Hula Girl Sings (2001), Meno now revels in the massive confusion and helpless bravado of adolescence as he portrays misfit teens dismayed by adult misery, weirded out by their suddenly alien bodies, and angry over racism and class prejudice. This is all worthy if familiar stuff, and although Meno fails to dig deeply, he does write with verve and will entertain readers who find tales of teen misadventure and rock and roll irresistible. Donna Seaman Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved "Meno gives his proverbial coming-of-age tale a punk-rock edge, as seventeen-year-old Chicagoan Brian Oswald tries to land his first girlfriend . . . Meno ably explores Brian’s emotional uncertainty and his poignant youthful search for meaning . . . His gabby, heartfelt, and utterly believable take on adolescence strikes a winning chord." ― Publishers Weekly "Captures both the sweetness and sting of adolescence with unflinching honesty." ― Entertainment Weekly "Joe Meno writes with the energy, honesty, and emotional impact of the best punk rock. From the opening sentence to the very last word, Hairstyles of the Damned held me in his grip." ― Jim DeRogatis, pop music critic, Chicago Sun-Times "The most authentic young voice since J.D. Salinger’s Holden Caulfield . . . A darn good book." ― Daily Southtown "Sensitive, well-observed, often laugh-out-loud funny . . . You won’t regret a moment of the journey." ― Chicago Tribune The debut novel from Akashic's new imprint, PUNK PLANET BOOKS. JOE MENO is a fiction writer and journalist who lives in Chicago. Winner of the Nelson Algren Literary Award, a Pushcart Prize, and a finalist for the Story Prize, Meno is the best-selling author of several novels and short story collections including  Marvel and a Wonder, The Great Perhaps, The Boy Detective Fails, and  Hairstyles of the Damned; he also edited Chicago Noir: The Classics