In its simplest terms, "Second Ending" covers the step-by-step disintegration of a trumpet player named Andy Silvera who has become a hopeless hophead. The theme is what happened and how, not the why. Now in his last days, Andy is full of promises to kick the habit and get back in shape for a job audition. Alternating between exultation and despair, emotional anguish and abnormal lucidity, his is a tortured soul….

Any reader whose personal experience has touched the arena where drugs and music come together will soon accept the clinical, fascinating truth of Mr. Hunter's details. This truth extends beyond the authentic jargon of jive talk or addict talk to the overwhelming human tragedy looming high above. And it is heightened by the author's compassion for these victims of too much love of living who still register upon each other as accountable human beings long after society...