Donald Goines was a pimp, truck driver, heroin addict, factory worker, and career criminal. He was also one of the most popular Black contemporary writers having published sixteen novels, including Whoreson, Dopefiend, and Daddy Cool. Goines's unique brand of "street narrative" and "ghetto realism" mark him as the original street writer. Now, in the first in-depth biography of Goines's life, author Eddie B. Allen, Jr. explores exactly how one man made the transition from street hustler to bestselling author. With exclusive access to personal letters, treatments from unwritten books, photographs, and family members, Allen uncovers Goines's experiences with drugs, prostitutes, prison, and urban violence. Fans of Goines’s novels will note a dramatic parallelism between his life and fictional tales.