The place: New York. The time: the early eighties. The scene: a neon-lit comedy club. The cast: five would-be comics, their gags, their egos, their girls. The result: a devastatingly funny novel about the peculiar world of stand-up, where the ultimate prizes are fame and fornication -- and the ultimate aspiration is, quite simply, to be laughed at.Only Bill Maher could have written True Story. So he did. The host of ABC'S hugely successful Politically Incorrect, Maher is one of America's hottest comics.

But he was also around back in the Golden Age of comedy, when everybody wanted to be Eddie Murphy, and even the laundromat had its own stand-up night. Sit back as Maher puts you stageside at the very birth of the comedy boom. You'll laugh in all the right places. Hey, it's a True Story.