Big Sur, Jack Kerouac, 1962 

A sprawling, brawling, hard-drinking memoir of his time in San Francisco and Big Sur.  Other than Ferlinghetti whose City Lights Bookstore figures prominently in the tale, I was unable to identify the other characters which was a drawback.  It was also repetitive and ultimately boring as Kerouac and various others drank, smoked ‘weed’, passed out, got sick, and finally had the DT’s with paranoid delusions and other unpleasantness.  Great picture of Big Sur which resonated vividly given our visit there last month, but finally, a dated and depressing view of the Beat generation.