November Road - Lou Berney

November Road started out a little uneven for me. The opening chapter introduces us to Frank Guidry, who runs some of mob boss Carlos Marcello's small time business in New Orleans. We encounter Frank in one of his Bourbon Street bars making deals and turning on a friend. We learn that Seraphine is looking for Mackey and Frank is quick to sell him out after Mackey begs Frank for protection. The first chapters with Frank come out uneven as characters are introduced and discarded without knowing just who will be an important player and who is part of the disposable set up of Frank's character arc. 

Then comes a chapter with Charlotte, a woman dissatisfied with not quite meeting her potential in her marriage to her alcoholic husband Dooley and her misogynistic boss, Mr. Hotchkiss. Charlotte has two daughters, the precocious Rosemary, and the almost silent Joan. After a particularly awkward dinner with Dooley's parents, Dooley runs out to get a drink and Charlotte packs the girls into the car and hits the road.

In the meantime, John F. Kennedy is assassinated. Frank realizes he had been in Dallas setting up a get away car for the assassin. And it turns out that all of the pawns in Carlos' scheme to assassinate the president are turning up dead (most at the hands of Paul Barone - Carlos' heartless and indiscriminate killing machine). So Frank realizes he's likely next and starts to run.

Well you can't have two story lines involving Frank and Charlotte and not expect them to get intertwined, so they do when Frank realizes hiding as part of a family may make more sense than continuing to run on his own. So he gently ingratiates himself to Charlotte and they begin travelling together. 

Now the whole thing might be an annoying story deeply cliched in the story of redemptive love (because Frank needs redeeming) except that there is something ultimately likable about Charlotte. She grows in her own strength and confidence and is smarter than 99% of the other characters give her credit for. And for that, Charlotte brings this up to a 3-star read for me. 

We never really get what made Frank into the person he was at the beginning of the book, although it's hinted at. The stakes never feel very high for any of the likeable characters and the ending felt forced and predictable, but not very realistic. And the epilogue seemed overly contrived. So it was a fine quick read, but not necessarily memorable.

3/5