The Life and Times of the Last Kid Picked

David Benjamin pays homage to the exuberance of countless untamed boys who grew up in Middle America at mid-century.

Whether he’s stalking snakes in the bogs of Wisconsin, playing four-kid baseball with his bothersome little brother and two favorite cousins, leaping garbage cans for a beautiful little redheaded girl, or joining Chucky Dutcher for a movie marathon at the Erwin Theater, Benjamin is the kind of precocious ironist who would have found a sidekick in Huck Finn.

His tales and insights lyrically capture a precious moment in bygone American life, as Benjamin recalls the myriad scrapes, reckless escapades and wanderlust that once made childhood an exhilarating — or terrifying — adventure.

David Benjamin began his career as a storyteller in Mrs. Poss’ second-grade class at St. Mary’s School in Tomah, Wisconsin. His fictional memoir, The Life and Times of the Last Kid Picked, originally published by Random House, was reprinted by Last Kid Books in 2019. His Last Kid Books include a collection of his essays, Almost Killed by a Train of Thought, two  short story anthologies, The Melting Grandmother and Other Short Works and Christmas in a Jugular Vein and sixteen novels, Three’s a Crowd, A Sunday Kind of Love, Summer of ’68, Skulduggery in the Latin Quarter, Black Dragon, They Shot Kennedy, Fat Vinny’s Forbidden Love, Witness to the Crucifixion, Choose Moose, Bistro Nights, The Voice of the Dog and Benjamin’s Jim Otis mystery series, Jailbait, Bastard’s Bluff, Woman Trouble, Dead Shot and Cheat. As a journalist, Benjamin has edited newspapers, published and edited several magazines, and authored SUMO: A Thinking Fan’s Guide to Japan’s National Sport.

Since its launch in 2019, Benjamin’s publishing imprint, Last Kid Books, has won more than forty independent-press awards. These include, for They Shot Kennedy, the Midwest Book Awards’ 2021 grand prize for literary/historical/contemporary fiction, and a 2022 Silver Medal for Humor to Fat Vinny’s Forbidden Love in the Independent Book Publishers Association’s prestigious Benjamin Franklin Awards.

Benjamin and his wife, Junko Yoshida, have been married for ages. They live sometimes in Madison, Wis., and the rest of the time in Paris.