Because this author’s previous book is one of my favorite of all times, I had very high expectations for
The Lincoln Highway: A Novel by Amor Towles
See my previous posts on: A Gentleman in Moscow and his first book, Rules of Civility.
This new title refers to the first road to stretch across America. The intro pages included a map, which I always appreciate.
In 1954, an orphaned 18-year-old Emmett is driven back home to Nebraska from a juvenile work farm. His plan is to retrieve his 8-year-old brother Billy and head to California for a fresh start. Until… two friends from the work farm emerge from the warden’s trunk and have their own plans that will take Emmett and Billy in the opposite direction, to New York.
Set over 10 days and told from multiple perspectives, what follows is an adventure that mostly didn’t remind me of Towle’s other two books but occasionally did due to the memorable characters and their/his storytelling.
“You could wait your whole life to say a sentence like that and not have the presence of mind to say it when the time comes. That sort of level-headedness isn’t the product of upbringing or practice. You’re either born with it or you’re not. And mostly, you’re not.”
duchess talking about emmett
When the book first switched voices from Emmett to Duchess, I was initially disappointed, wanting to hear more from Emmett. But Duchess, the son of a traveling Shakespearean actor, has a unique perspective from a life of adventures.
I especially loved Duchess’s descriptions and imitations of “Leonellos” an Italian restaurant with only 10 booths, which reminded me of all the culinary details in Towle’s previous book.
Duchess is complicated and inspires both appreciation and anger (for Emmett and a reader).
Billy the younger brother is some sort of boy wonder genius who develops a special friendship with each of the older boys and anyone else he comes across. Billy is a reader obsessed with a, I believe fictional, work of fiction by “Professor Abernathe” that details all kinds of journeys, including one of my favorites, Ulysses (from Homer though not from Joyce).
This book is a journey in all ways, through emotions, perspectives, settings. You’ll go to a red-light circus, the top of the Empire state building, an orphanage, a train car, a camp for hobos, a mansion, a seedy bar – just some examples of where this book takes you.
It is another masterpiece from Towles that most readers will thoroughly enjoy; it is easily one of my favorite books of the year.