Fall 98

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.

Daniel Spero is a novelist, scriptwriter and musician born on September 14, 1977 in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Daniel has written six novels that follow tragic lead character and alter ego Julian Jakos, including Battle Creek, Fall 98, Chicago, The Greek Tragedy, Hun King the Ice-Head, and his latest novel, White Horse. He has also written a sci-fi trilogy and a book of sci-fi and fantasy short stories. Additionally, Daniel compiled and edited his grandfather's WWII diary, The WWII Diary of Captain George B. Spero, and penned scripts for 3 TV shows and 7 films.