For anyone who’s ever followed the music and found themselves instead.
Come along for a wild ride through the mosh pits, parking lots, and the backstage hallways of a generation’s soundtrack. Told with biting humor and unflinching honesty, Daniel Spero blends memoir and cultural anthropology to create a kinetic, immersive experience. From a wide-eyed nine-year-old at a Monkees reunion show to a seasoned soul following nineties Phish and dodging glowsticks, this is a deeply personal archive of one man's passage through youth, identity, loss, and love.
More than just a collection of concert stories, this is a raucous, unfiltered chronicle of rebellion, transformation, and the rhythms that shaped a life. If you ever got high at Lollapalooza, took a road trip for a show, or felt the thrum of a kick drum from the floor of an arena, this book will hit you right in the chest—and make you laugh your ass off while it does. A Life in Concert is a deeply human reminder that sometimes the loudest noise in our lives leads us to the quiet truths that matter most.
www.amazon.com/Life-Concert-Daniel-Spero/dp/1727010949/ref=sr_1_1?crid=JAVB6YMH1NU9&keywords=a+life+in+concert+daniel+spero&qid=1668407130&sprefix=a+life+in+concert+daniel+spero%2Caps%2C329&sr=8-1
Come along for a wild ride through the mosh pits, parking lots, and the backstage hallways of a generation’s soundtrack. Told with biting humor and unflinching honesty, Daniel Spero blends memoir and cultural anthropology to create a kinetic, immersive experience. From a wide-eyed nine-year-old at a Monkees reunion show to a seasoned soul following nineties Phish and dodging glowsticks, this is a deeply personal archive of one man's passage through youth, identity, loss, and love.
More than just a collection of concert stories, this is a raucous, unfiltered chronicle of rebellion, transformation, and the rhythms that shaped a life. If you ever got high at Lollapalooza, took a road trip for a show, or felt the thrum of a kick drum from the floor of an arena, this book will hit you right in the chest—and make you laugh your ass off while it does. A Life in Concert is a deeply human reminder that sometimes the loudest noise in our lives leads us to the quiet truths that matter most.
www.amazon.com/Life-Concert-Daniel-Spero/dp/1727010949/ref=sr_1_1?crid=JAVB6YMH1NU9&keywords=a+life+in+concert+daniel+spero&qid=1668407130&sprefix=a+life+in+concert+daniel+spero%2Caps%2C329&sr=8-1
What if the absurd was the most honest thing left?
Wait for Juan is a kaleidoscopic journey through worlds both strange and familiar, where the rules of reality bend, and the boundaries between past, future and other dimensions blur. With half the stories forming a wild, tangled narrative and the rest standing proudly on their own, this book vaults from dystopian futures to psychedelic investigations. From a haunting fable about a mythical Michigan dune to a cosmic launch gone awry, from sentient beings debating the ethics of humanity to a hallucinogenic murder investigation anchored in alien telepathy, each tale unearths deeper truths beneath its imaginative premise.
With a voice that’s equal parts biting and profound, Wait for Juan mixes heady science fiction concepts with dark comedy and gut-punching emotion. Whether you're here for time-bending myth or rogue astronauts, these stories will challenge, amuse, and stay with you.
www.amazon.com/Wait-Juan-Daniel-Spero-ebook/dp/B096VL5QQ7/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1OILBTJWXBGL5&keywords=wait+for+juan+daniel+spero&qid=1668407259&sprefix=wait+for+juan+daniel+spero%2Caps%2C472&sr=8-1
Wait for Juan is a kaleidoscopic journey through worlds both strange and familiar, where the rules of reality bend, and the boundaries between past, future and other dimensions blur. With half the stories forming a wild, tangled narrative and the rest standing proudly on their own, this book vaults from dystopian futures to psychedelic investigations. From a haunting fable about a mythical Michigan dune to a cosmic launch gone awry, from sentient beings debating the ethics of humanity to a hallucinogenic murder investigation anchored in alien telepathy, each tale unearths deeper truths beneath its imaginative premise.
With a voice that’s equal parts biting and profound, Wait for Juan mixes heady science fiction concepts with dark comedy and gut-punching emotion. Whether you're here for time-bending myth or rogue astronauts, these stories will challenge, amuse, and stay with you.
www.amazon.com/Wait-Juan-Daniel-Spero-ebook/dp/B096VL5QQ7/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1OILBTJWXBGL5&keywords=wait+for+juan+daniel+spero&qid=1668407259&sprefix=wait+for+juan+daniel+spero%2Caps%2C472&sr=8-1
Expat life was supposed to be an escape. Instead, it became a trap.
Hun King the Ice-Head is a raw, unflinching, and darkly comic descent into the expat underworld of Southeast Asia, where drugs are cheap, the women are younger than your regrets, and disappearing is easier than getting clean.
Told from multiple perspectives, this novel traces the unraveling of Gary Pender, a once-guarded cynic who, after years abroad, finds himself seduced by the very vices he used to mock. As Gary slips further into a meth-fueled haze alongside his favorite bar girl, Makara, his estranged family grows desperate and flies halfway across the world from Ontario to Phnom Penh to find him—but the only person who knows where Gary is, or what he’s become, is Julian, the best friend he pushed away in favor of the pipe.
Based on real events, Hun King the Ice-Head is a brutally honest snapshot of expats gone feral, laying bare the delusions of Western men abroad and the emotional wreckage they leave in their wake. Written with searing insight, gallows humor, and a voice that doesn’t flinch, this isn’t a redemption story—it’s a reckoning.
www.amazon.com/Hun-King-Ice-Head-Daniel-Spero-ebook/dp/B07B4SFT74/ref=sr_1_1?crid=313N5KBU8YTSD&keywords=hun+king+daniel+spero&qid=1668407348&sprefix=hun+king+daniel+spero%2Caps%2C339&sr=8-1
Hun King the Ice-Head is a raw, unflinching, and darkly comic descent into the expat underworld of Southeast Asia, where drugs are cheap, the women are younger than your regrets, and disappearing is easier than getting clean.
Told from multiple perspectives, this novel traces the unraveling of Gary Pender, a once-guarded cynic who, after years abroad, finds himself seduced by the very vices he used to mock. As Gary slips further into a meth-fueled haze alongside his favorite bar girl, Makara, his estranged family grows desperate and flies halfway across the world from Ontario to Phnom Penh to find him—but the only person who knows where Gary is, or what he’s become, is Julian, the best friend he pushed away in favor of the pipe.
Based on real events, Hun King the Ice-Head is a brutally honest snapshot of expats gone feral, laying bare the delusions of Western men abroad and the emotional wreckage they leave in their wake. Written with searing insight, gallows humor, and a voice that doesn’t flinch, this isn’t a redemption story—it’s a reckoning.
www.amazon.com/Hun-King-Ice-Head-Daniel-Spero-ebook/dp/B07B4SFT74/ref=sr_1_1?crid=313N5KBU8YTSD&keywords=hun+king+daniel+spero&qid=1668407348&sprefix=hun+king+daniel+spero%2Caps%2C339&sr=8-1
Across centuries, cultures and lifetimes, death plays the same refrain — a chorus of endings that never truly end.
This genre-defying collection of interconnected short stories explores the many faces of death across time, space, and culture. From the ancient hills of Greece to far-flung futures where memory itself can be traded or erased, The Dead Beats pulses with lyrical insight and philosophical depth. Each story stands alone, yet together they form a greater whole—a meditation on mortality, legacy, justice, and the strange beauty of impermanence.
With prose that is both poetic and precise, Daniel Spero guides readers through intimate tragedies, grand reckonings, and moments of eerie transcendence in this haunting and resonant collection that lingers long after the final page. Characters rise and fall. Civilizations crumble and evolve. And through it all, death remains not as a punctuation mark, but a rhythm—insistent, ever-present, and deeply human.
www.amazon.com/Dead-Beats-Daniel-Spero/dp/B0BJ4WKV3T/ref=sr_1_1?crid=36JS3J4RGY790&keywords=the+dead+beats+daniel+spero&qid=1668407076&sprefix=the+dead+beats+daniel+spero%2Caps%2C384&sr=8-1
This genre-defying collection of interconnected short stories explores the many faces of death across time, space, and culture. From the ancient hills of Greece to far-flung futures where memory itself can be traded or erased, The Dead Beats pulses with lyrical insight and philosophical depth. Each story stands alone, yet together they form a greater whole—a meditation on mortality, legacy, justice, and the strange beauty of impermanence.
With prose that is both poetic and precise, Daniel Spero guides readers through intimate tragedies, grand reckonings, and moments of eerie transcendence in this haunting and resonant collection that lingers long after the final page. Characters rise and fall. Civilizations crumble and evolve. And through it all, death remains not as a punctuation mark, but a rhythm—insistent, ever-present, and deeply human.
www.amazon.com/Dead-Beats-Daniel-Spero/dp/B0BJ4WKV3T/ref=sr_1_1?crid=36JS3J4RGY790&keywords=the+dead+beats+daniel+spero&qid=1668407076&sprefix=the+dead+beats+daniel+spero%2Caps%2C384&sr=8-1
Clarity found in the chaos of Saigon’s streets.
A Life in Saigon is a sharp, searingly honest, and wildly entertaining pictorial memoir of expat life in modern-day Vietnam—where propaganda still reigns and nap time is mandatory. From teaching English and clashing with government censors to marrying a woman who bathes out of a bucket and nearly dying of cholera, Spero delivers a ferociously funny, acid-tongued examination of what it means to be a foreigner in a place that rarely makes sense—and seldom tries to.
Part travelogue, part journalistic exposé, part love letter to his daughter, A Life in Saigon is a portrait of a man and a city—both rough around the edges, both stubbornly alive. It’s a must-read for anyone curious about life off the American grid, or what happens when love and lunacy cross cultures. Một, hai, ba—dzô!
www.amazon.com/Life-Saigon-Daniel-Spero-ebook/dp/B088YPSZXH/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=daniel+spero&qid=1594175515&sr=8-1
A Life in Saigon is a sharp, searingly honest, and wildly entertaining pictorial memoir of expat life in modern-day Vietnam—where propaganda still reigns and nap time is mandatory. From teaching English and clashing with government censors to marrying a woman who bathes out of a bucket and nearly dying of cholera, Spero delivers a ferociously funny, acid-tongued examination of what it means to be a foreigner in a place that rarely makes sense—and seldom tries to.
Part travelogue, part journalistic exposé, part love letter to his daughter, A Life in Saigon is a portrait of a man and a city—both rough around the edges, both stubbornly alive. It’s a must-read for anyone curious about life off the American grid, or what happens when love and lunacy cross cultures. Một, hai, ba—dzô!
www.amazon.com/Life-Saigon-Daniel-Spero-ebook/dp/B088YPSZXH/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=daniel+spero&qid=1594175515&sr=8-1
Some jobs change your life. Others unravel it.
Told through a rotating cast of voices—including Jenna St. Claire, a scene-stealing drag queen with sharper instincts than heels--White Horse is a darkly comic exploration of raw sexuality, bureaucratic dysfunction and emotional fallout, set in a Boston-area nonprofit meant to serve at-risk youth—but where buried traumas, unchecked egos, and a murder investigation threaten to unravel everything its staff pretends to stand for.
At the center is Julian Jakos, an aspiring writer and expatriate recently returned from Southeast Asia, now sleeping on a friend’s couch and grasping for a new start. Hoping to find material for his next book—and maybe a sense of purpose—he takes a job at White Horse. But when a colleague is found dead, charred in a dumpster behind an auto parts store, Julian is drawn into an unofficial investigation that spirals into a meditation on truth, desire, and institutional decay.
As he navigates a maze of office politics and the layered identities of those within the crossdressing and fetish scenes, White Horse becomes a study in moral ambiguity, self-reinvention, and the fragile systems we rely on to hold our lives together. Wry, unflinching, and deeply humane, it’s a portrait of the people who try to fix broken things—and what it costs them to pretend they can.
www.amazon.com/White-Horse-Daniel-Spero-ebook/dp/B0BY5PZ1XM?ref_=ast_author_dp
Told through a rotating cast of voices—including Jenna St. Claire, a scene-stealing drag queen with sharper instincts than heels--White Horse is a darkly comic exploration of raw sexuality, bureaucratic dysfunction and emotional fallout, set in a Boston-area nonprofit meant to serve at-risk youth—but where buried traumas, unchecked egos, and a murder investigation threaten to unravel everything its staff pretends to stand for.
At the center is Julian Jakos, an aspiring writer and expatriate recently returned from Southeast Asia, now sleeping on a friend’s couch and grasping for a new start. Hoping to find material for his next book—and maybe a sense of purpose—he takes a job at White Horse. But when a colleague is found dead, charred in a dumpster behind an auto parts store, Julian is drawn into an unofficial investigation that spirals into a meditation on truth, desire, and institutional decay.
As he navigates a maze of office politics and the layered identities of those within the crossdressing and fetish scenes, White Horse becomes a study in moral ambiguity, self-reinvention, and the fragile systems we rely on to hold our lives together. Wry, unflinching, and deeply humane, it’s a portrait of the people who try to fix broken things—and what it costs them to pretend they can.
www.amazon.com/White-Horse-Daniel-Spero-ebook/dp/B0BY5PZ1XM?ref_=ast_author_dp
Not all tragedies end in death—some end in diarrhea, disillusionment, and dodging motorbikes.
The Greek Tragedy is a blisteringly candid memoir of cross-cultural chaos, expat drift, and unexpected connection. Julian heads to Vietnam to teach English and maybe find some purpose. What he gets instead: wallet-nicking ladyboys, crotch-grabbing bargirls, rabid cabbies, communist HR reps, pool-sharking street kids, and a front-row seat to Saigon’s full-throttle insanity. Equal parts travelogue, coming-of-age farce, and exorcism of Western delusion, The Greek Tragedy is a gritty, booze-soaked plunge into the surreal underworld of Vietnam’s expat scene.
What begins as madcap misadventure turns into something deeper—a brutal look at power, privilege, and how we perform identity in places we barely understand. Written with balls-out humor and manic insight, this is the memoir of a man who didn’t just go off-grid—he slammed into it headfirst on a Honda Dream as he chases something meaningful. Hilarious, yet weirdly tender, The Greek Tragedy is what happens when adventure travel goes sideways—and keeps on going. A must-read for anyone who’s ever tried to outrun themselves on the other side of the world.
www.amazon.com/Greek-Tragedy-Daniel-Spero/dp/B08C9CZ1DY/ref=sr_1_3?dchild=1&keywords=daniel+spero&qid=1594175420&sr=8-3
The Greek Tragedy is a blisteringly candid memoir of cross-cultural chaos, expat drift, and unexpected connection. Julian heads to Vietnam to teach English and maybe find some purpose. What he gets instead: wallet-nicking ladyboys, crotch-grabbing bargirls, rabid cabbies, communist HR reps, pool-sharking street kids, and a front-row seat to Saigon’s full-throttle insanity. Equal parts travelogue, coming-of-age farce, and exorcism of Western delusion, The Greek Tragedy is a gritty, booze-soaked plunge into the surreal underworld of Vietnam’s expat scene.
What begins as madcap misadventure turns into something deeper—a brutal look at power, privilege, and how we perform identity in places we barely understand. Written with balls-out humor and manic insight, this is the memoir of a man who didn’t just go off-grid—he slammed into it headfirst on a Honda Dream as he chases something meaningful. Hilarious, yet weirdly tender, The Greek Tragedy is what happens when adventure travel goes sideways—and keeps on going. A must-read for anyone who’s ever tried to outrun themselves on the other side of the world.
www.amazon.com/Greek-Tragedy-Daniel-Spero/dp/B08C9CZ1DY/ref=sr_1_3?dchild=1&keywords=daniel+spero&qid=1594175420&sr=8-3
Somewhere between the Brown Line and breakdown.
Ever shared a drafty apartment with a hoarding stutterer, ducked eviction calls from your slumlord, and watched your girlfriend dissolve into a blur of bar hookups?
Welcome to Chicago, Daniel Spero’s laugh-so-you-don’t-cry tale of Julian Jakos—a broke, weed-smoking writer drifting between Craigslist apartments, doomed relationships, and sub-zero winters. This semi-autobiographical novel is a darkly comic descent into heartbreak, burnout, and the messy business of self-reinvention in early-2000s America.
After a wrecked relationship in Boston, Julian heads to Chicago hoping for a fresh start. What he finds is eviction threats, existential dread, and the kind of soul-searching that only happens when you’re high, alone, and 26. Chicago is a raw, lyrical ode to the dreamers who don’t make it—and the bills that still do.
www.amazon.com/Chicago-Daniel-Spero-ebook/dp/B07HR2CZD4/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1540102050&sr=8-1&keywords=daniel+spero
Ever shared a drafty apartment with a hoarding stutterer, ducked eviction calls from your slumlord, and watched your girlfriend dissolve into a blur of bar hookups?
Welcome to Chicago, Daniel Spero’s laugh-so-you-don’t-cry tale of Julian Jakos—a broke, weed-smoking writer drifting between Craigslist apartments, doomed relationships, and sub-zero winters. This semi-autobiographical novel is a darkly comic descent into heartbreak, burnout, and the messy business of self-reinvention in early-2000s America.
After a wrecked relationship in Boston, Julian heads to Chicago hoping for a fresh start. What he finds is eviction threats, existential dread, and the kind of soul-searching that only happens when you’re high, alone, and 26. Chicago is a raw, lyrical ode to the dreamers who don’t make it—and the bills that still do.
www.amazon.com/Chicago-Daniel-Spero-ebook/dp/B07HR2CZD4/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1540102050&sr=8-1&keywords=daniel+spero
- Following the music to the edge of America—and the end of an era.
Fall 98 is a visceral, untamed memoir-fiction hybrid chronicling one young man’s escape from the fluorescent purgatory of second-shift factory work into the anarchic underworld of 1998 Phish tour—a whirlwind of jam-band fervor, chemical indulgence, and a deranged buddy-road-trip-meets-musical-pilgrimage.
Written at just 21, Daniel Spero channels full-throttle gonzo energy as he follows Julian Jakos and his delusional tour partner, “Ultra Funk,” across the cracked asphalt of a pre-millennial America teetering between burnout and revelation. What begins as a quest for freedom spirals into a surreal descent—through parking lot prophets, warped detours, ill-advised hookups, and the dying embers of analog youth.
Part punk confessional, part hippy tour log, and part grotesque comedy of errors, Fall 98 is a debut that doesn’t flinch, doesn’t apologize, and sure as hell doesn’t brake. The music is wild, the road is endless, and as Julian comes unglued chasing autonomy, this misadventure becomes something more: the final, feral howl of a generation raised on mixtapes, mistrust, and the hope that one good show could change everything.
www.amazon.com/Fall-98-Daniel-Spero/dp/1453687637/ref=sr_1_12?dchild=1&keywords=daniel+spero&qid=1594176481&sr=8-12
From Fort Custer to the Coral Sea—one soldier’s long journey home.
The WWII Diary of Captain George B. Spero is a candid, pictorial memoir that fuses firsthand testimony with rare wartime ephemera. Forget the Hollywood version—this is World War II through the eyes of a no-nonsense anti-aircraft captain: sardine-packed troop transports, endless rumor mills, tropical illnesses, lifeboat drills, and the slow grind of bureaucracy. From Rio to Townsville to Horn Island, Spero offers a front-row seat to the Pacific Theater’s forgotten corners—captured in real-time reflections and historic photos.
When Captain George B. Spero boarded the Queen Mary in 1942, he carried more than a duffel bag—he smuggled aboard a forbidden diary. The result is a vivid account of daily life at war: the boredom and tension, the dark humor and homesickness, rendered with sharp clarity and dry wit. This is living history—unfiltered and unvarnished—from a man who saw it firsthand.
More than a diary, this book is a powerful meditation on duty, disillusionment, and endurance. Whether read by historians, descendants of the Greatest Generation, or curious newcomers, The WWII Diary of Captain George B. Spero is both a classroom-ready artifact and a lasting family legacy.
www.amazon.com/World-Diary-Captain-George-Spero/dp/1440416702/ref=sr_1_13?dchild=1&keywords=daniel+spero&qid=1594176682&sr=8-13
The WWII Diary of Captain George B. Spero is a candid, pictorial memoir that fuses firsthand testimony with rare wartime ephemera. Forget the Hollywood version—this is World War II through the eyes of a no-nonsense anti-aircraft captain: sardine-packed troop transports, endless rumor mills, tropical illnesses, lifeboat drills, and the slow grind of bureaucracy. From Rio to Townsville to Horn Island, Spero offers a front-row seat to the Pacific Theater’s forgotten corners—captured in real-time reflections and historic photos.
When Captain George B. Spero boarded the Queen Mary in 1942, he carried more than a duffel bag—he smuggled aboard a forbidden diary. The result is a vivid account of daily life at war: the boredom and tension, the dark humor and homesickness, rendered with sharp clarity and dry wit. This is living history—unfiltered and unvarnished—from a man who saw it firsthand.
More than a diary, this book is a powerful meditation on duty, disillusionment, and endurance. Whether read by historians, descendants of the Greatest Generation, or curious newcomers, The WWII Diary of Captain George B. Spero is both a classroom-ready artifact and a lasting family legacy.
www.amazon.com/World-Diary-Captain-George-Spero/dp/1440416702/ref=sr_1_13?dchild=1&keywords=daniel+spero&qid=1594176682&sr=8-13
