Danny Santiago occupies a curious place in Chicano literature. From 1970 when his first short story, "The Somebody," was published in Redbook (February) until 1983 when his novel, Famous All Over Town, was published by Simon and Schuster, Santiago maintained a low profile. He granted no interviews, answered no phones, and only corresponded with agents and editors through a post office box in Pacific Grove, California. Then in the summer of 1984 Santiago suddenly emerged from obscurity and into the limelight when his identity was revealed by novelist and screenwriter John Gregory Dunne.

"Danny Santiago is not his name," Dunne wrote in an explosive essay that appeared in the New York Review of Books (16 August 1984). "He is not a Chicano. Nor is he young. He is 73 years old. He is an Anglo. He is a graduate of Andover and Yale. His name is Daniel James." Dunne's article solved the Santiago mystery...