Second Ending

The Blackboard Jungle, Evan Hunter’s hard-hitting novel about juvenile delinquency, aroused a storm of controversy over the vocational-school system in America today. His publishers feel that Second Ending is a strong successor to that book in sheer storytelling power as well as in its presentation of another contemporary problem — that of the talented but insecure young people who turn the wrong way in their efforts to find themselves.

Music was a part of Andy Silvera. It started with the jiggle of his toes and it spread up through the length of his leg and into the pit of his diaphragm, up through his lungs and out through his lips, and down through the horn. The decorations in the hall began to sway a little when he really cut loose. But there was a part of Andy that wasn’t as solid as his trumpet playing. Although he had once had a good friend in Bud Donato, he had picked up some other friends meanwhile whose names were cocaine, opium, morphine, and heroin.

Bud had his problems too. A hitch in the Navy had left him trying to finish his college course on an accelerated schedule and he was on the edge of flunking. Needing every second to cram for exams, he found himself suddenly faced with the problem of playing nursemaid to Andy. Andy, whom he hadn’t seen in over two years. Andy, who had picked up those strange new friends. Impatient to get on with his own affairs, but saddled with the seemingly impossible burden of Andy, Bud had to learn the hard way about what responsibility and love mean. A girl named Helen helped, but Bud was a long time in finding himself, as well as in appreciating Helen.

We think you will find Second Ending a gripping and exciting story. It contains all the narrative appeal of Evan Hunter’s first novel, but in addition the canvas against which he paints has new dimensions of depth and understanding.