Monterey: A View from Garlic Hill

Monterey: A View from Garlic Hill by Cutino, Peter J.. paperback edition. ISBN: 9780940168374.

From his "Garlic Hill" neighborhood in Monterey, young "Petru" Cutino sees a rough and ready waterfront community far different from that found today, a commercial fishing community in which the Old World traditions of its Sicilian immigrants dictate all aspects of a young mans life. The era chronicled is 1938 to 1951. Cannery Row is in its heyday and Alvarado Street is a salty amalgam of marine supply stores, Mexican bars, pool halls, and tiny Mom-And-Pop diners. Cutinos riotous stories, often told in "Old Time" Sicilian, will return you to a place, and a people, you thought existed only in Steinbeck.