Diane Lattimer is an eighteen-year-old single mother struggling with the separation from her infant son who has been sent to live with a foster family in Long Island. Strapped with guilt, Diane searches for redemption in souls as lost as her own, in the jazz-and drug-fueled hipsters of Greenwich Village. Finding solace only in one-night stands and an increasing dependence on drugs, Diane spirals into a world of violence and drug abuse, leaving her destitute and addicted to heroin. Struggling to stave off the addiction, Diane searches for help from the various people who move in and out of her life. Diane's mother tells her daughter she must reject the sins of the Village and turn to God; Dincher, the tough, young junkie, who dreams of some day playing horn alongside Louis Armstrong; Joe Letrigo, the southern gentleman who can't forget Diane's ungainly reputation; and Carter Webb, the husband of Diane's gravely ill sister, Edna, and possibly the only person who can truly save Diane. Years before its time in dealing seriously with topics like drug abuse, women's liberation, and sexual freedom, Flee the Angry Strangers is the first Beat novel and a true rediscovered classic.