In the spring of 1943, during a stint in the Merchant Marine, twenty-one-year-oldJack Kerouacset out to write his first novel. Working diligently day and night to complete it by hand, he titled itThe Sea Is My Brother. Now, nearly seventy years later, its long-awaited publication provides fascinating details and insight into the early life and development of an American literary icon.Written seven years beforeThe Town and The Cityofficially launched his writing career,The Sea Is My Brothermarks a pivotal point in which Kerouac began laying the foundations for his pioneering method and signature style. A clear precursor to such landmark works asOn the Road, The Dharma Bums,andVisions of Cody, it is an important formative work that bears all the hallmarks of classic Kerouac: the search for spiritual meaning in a materialistic world, spontaneous travel as the true road to freedom, late nights in bars and apartments engaged in intense conversation, the desperate urge to escape from society, and the strange, terrible beauty of loneliness