For the first time ever I found a book I wanted in Waterstone’s bargain box. Hardback, heavy, 500 pages and costing £3.00. This is the second Amor Towles book I have read, The Gentleman in Moscow being the first. I fell in love, totally, with that novel but this was utterly different. It is a Bildingsroman of a sort, the American sort. Two brothers who have been dealt a bad deal by life try to find a way forward and this involves travelling from one side of America to the other along the Lincoln Highway.
This stretch of road, built in 1912, starts in Times Square in New York and covers three thousand three hundred and ninety miles, finishing in Lincoln Park in San Francisco.
Set in the early 1950s, this extraordinary journey contains vivid characters and accomplished writing and is quite a compulsive read … but do read The Gentleman in Moscow first!