Historical thriller re-imagines the JFK assassination
In November of 1963, a national tragedy took place in Dallas when a sniper high up in the Texas Book Depository building began firing bullets toward the presidential motorcade which was passing by below.
The assassin Lee Harvey Oswald mortally wounded President John F. Kennedy that day.
Shortly after Oswald was in custody he was murdered by Jack Ruby, a nightclub owner. A stunned America watched Ruby lunge toward Oswald and fire a pistol on live television. Later on the Warren Commission determined that Oswald had acted alone. End of story, right?
Well, for the past 55 years the assassination of JFK has been the subject of wild speculation and conspiracy theories. There have been questions about whether Oswald really acted alone. How could he have fired his weapon with such lethal accuracy from so far away? Was there a second shooter on “the grassy knoll?”
Lou Berney has set his new novel “November Road” during the time leading up to that dark day in Dallas and the days that followed in the aftermath of the acts by Oswald and Ruby. There have been rumors that organized crime figures had conspired to kill the president. In Berney’s book a New Orleans mobster named Carlos Marcello organizes the plot.
The protagonist of the nov elisa fellow named Frank Guidry. Guidry has been a loyal henchman of Marcello’s and when he completes a routine assignment for his boss he doesn’t think much about it until later on when he hears about the assassination in Dallas. He realize s right away that he better leave town quickly and disappear.
You see Guidry had dropped off a car in Dallas. As soon as he heard about the assassination he realized that Marcello sent him there with the getaway vehicle for the assassin and now Guidry has a target on his back because he understand that Marcello instigated a conspiracy.
Meanwhile out in Okla- homa a woman named Charlotte has finally had enough of her marriage to a man with a drinking problem. She puts her two daughters in the car and heads for California. Guidry is fleeing in the same direction and they are destined to meet.
A third character, a lethal hit man for the Marcello organization, is hot on Guidry’s trail. This single-minded killer is methodical and relentless and as he tracks Frank and Charlotte to Las Vegas this reviewer grudgingly began to feel some respect for this demonic man with an impeccable work ethic.
Initially Guidry latched on to Charlotte and her daughters to try t op rovide some cover from his pursuers. His cynical masquerade as a family man with a wife and two daughters could confuse some of the many observers Marcello has asked to watch out for Guidry. A complication begins to arise; love. Women in his past seemed disposable. But not this one.
“November Road” is a compelling historical road novel and thriller.
The author takes readers through some treacherous curves. The astonishing ending came as a shock but after some consideration it felt completely appropriate.