New York: Ticknor & Fields, 1991. dj. SIGNED hardcover first edition - "The life of the mythic, wealthy journalist/short-story writer of the Broadway classic 'Guys and Dolls', told by the legendary, wealthy journalist/novel writer of 'Table Money', etc. . .This Runyon with all his invented dialogue must be a fiction - but so what when the page is drugged with such high humor? Runyon at eight cut his teeth as his father's printer's devil in the western states, at 15 was on his own as a wandering reporter. He was a shy, quiet poet with a withering view of mankind - and also a man of warm fellowship with murderers, gamblers, and criminals who fed him the life in his copy and later became his fictional characters. Breslin excels at creating the mirror-reversed moral world of criminals - people who later become Runyonesques by choice. Breslin's best - and more impressive in its sustained cynicism than Runyon's own writing. Could live forever." (Kirkus Reviews) INSCRIBED on the title page. 410 pp. ISBN: 0-899199844.