Great read! Amor Towles' eagerly anticipated and long-awaited third novel does not disappoint! 576 pages of absolutely engaging characters, traveling on an unexpected journey, who stay with you long after the last page is finished. I loved this book! I'm jealous of those of you who haven't read The Lincoln Highway yet. You're in for a treat!

The Lincoln Highway: A Novel, Amor Towles, author; Edoardo Ballerini, Marin Ireland, Dion Graham, narrators
Towles has woven a story about the life of several young boys in the middle of the 20th century. Using the Lincoln Highway as the road to their future and as the vehicle to expose their secrets and dreams, he unravels an amazing tale. The Depression, the Holocaust, Prohibition, droughts, and all manner of crimes have occurred, the consequences of which reverberate from generation to generation. This story is at once hard to believe and yet highly plausible.
The characters are diverse in color, religion, background and behavior, but they are all suffering in one way or another and are all presumed to be in, or rapidly approaching, their late teens. As a teenager, Emmett Watson made a grave mistake. A wayward punch led to the death of a bully who was insulting the memory of his father, Charles Watson. Emmett paid for his crime and was on his way to start a new life after his father's death and the foreclosure proceedings for his dad's farm. Emmett wanted to go to Texas with his little brother, only 8 years old, to begin a career in carpentry and real estate. His brother Billy, however, wanted to go to San Francisco to search for his mother who has abandoned the family shortly after Billy’s birth.
While in the Salina reformatory, Emmett met Duchess and Woolly. Duchess, a chameleon able to take on many different personas, had been abandoned as a child and abused by his dad. He had no moral compass, seemed unaware of his wrongdoings, and constantly wove believable tales to excuse them. Woolly, from the upper class, was brought up with every luxury and coddled but ostracized because he -was simple-minded and took everything literally. He was, contrasted with Duchess, completely without guile. Sally, unspoken for, lived with her father who was busy ordering her around like a maid and accumulating real estate. She yearned to be free of his demands. Billy, at 8 years old was likely the brightest bulb in the group, but he was totally naïve, often creating more problems than solutions. His favorite book is “Professor Abacus Abernathe's Compendium of Heroes, Adventurers and Intrepid Travelers”. He uses it as his guide through life's many moments. He extrapolates solutions and offers advice to all, based on the wisdom of the characters within the book. Ulysses is a hobo who is instrumental in saving the lives of the Watson brothers. How he became a hobo involves the choices that he made, which he now regrets by choosing his lonely lifestyle. While his past and present choices were consequential, were they right or wrong? Townhouse, from Harlem, is aware of the rules of the street and their requirements to survive. He is a leader and in charge on the street. He and Emmett made a connection at Salina. There are many more characters entering and exiting the pages of the book as we travel with them on the historic Lincoln Highway. It goes from the Southwest in California, to the Northeast and New York. It was privately funded. The travels begin in Nebraska. Other influential characters are Professor Abernathe, Sarah, the sheriff, Sister Agnes, Kaitlin, the corrupt pastor, etc. They all play a vital role in the way Emmet’s life unfolds. They all symbolize unique bits of society’s good and evil. Each character views the same situation through different eyes and draws separate conclusions. Each character brings out some new flaw or benefit of the human condition and the way they interact in different situations.
At the end, one will ask, do we ever truly know someone else or understand their motives or their decisions? We will wonder what is right and wrong in different situations. We will think about those that always seem to be victims of circumstance. We will wonder about appropriate consequences for our decisions and actions. Do the punishments fit the crimes and mistakes? Are they arbitrary? Are they deserved? We might begin to question what is morality? Is revenge ever a suitable solution? What about suicide or the taking of drugs? Does our legal system that requires retribution actually accomplish anything positive? Is it all right to occasionally break the rules or do we fool ourselves by excusing our misdeeds with false excuses meant to clear our consciences? When I finished the book, I also wondered, would there be a second? Would this be a series? There were a lot of unanswered questions? Would Emmett be haunted by his actions at the end? Would Sally find happiness? Wouldl Sarah understand how her own behavior might have influenced what happened to her brother Woolly? Does Billy keep searching for his mom? Does he ever find her? Does Emmet become a successful businessman and do Ulysses and Mr. Abernathy find happiness? Do scores have to be settled?
I loved the book with its constant twists and turns, with its character development and descriptions of each scene. I was always involved and interested, but the ending left me a bit wanting. Was this Lincoln Road, or even the rails, going to lead any of the characters to a happy ending as they hurtled toward their destinies? I thought that certain objects seemed so important that they, too, became characters in the novel, like the Studebaker, the little red book, the panda, the little bottle of “medicine” as well as the different timepieces and the fedora. I marveled at the amount of research that went into the book. Every human condition was explored, family relationships, abandonment, orphans, bullies, thugs, criminal minds, the war, the railroads, the roads themselves, family dynamics and more. Towles knowledge of the landscape and roads traveled, his awareness of the way a child thinks as opposed to an adult, the contrast of female and male characterizations, the presentation of anti-Semitism and racism, the observations about rich vs. poor upbringing, white vs. black lives, even in poverty, rural vs. city life, and the expressed insights into hope vs. despair, dreams vs. nightmares, justice vs. injustice, greed vs. kindness, ignorance vs. wisdom were all spot on. This is a story that covers so many personalities and the multitude of reasons for the way they developed. It will consistently draw you back into it, even with the many tangents and distractions that enter the narrative as the author focuses on one or another of them. This is also an audio that was highly enhanced by each of the narrator's interpretations of the scenes and the characters' personalities. Read it.

Not everyone in our club finished it...I for one gave up but those that did finish it liked it. We actually rated it 3.75.

Love the writing and characters but sometimes felt too long.

Wow! What a powerful story told by the author from the 1950's. I read A Gentlemen in Moscow so was familiar with the author. You'll go on an adventure with Professor Abernathe's Compendium of Heroes, Adventures and other Intrepid Travelers for sure! It was supposed to be a journey for Emmett & Billy to California in the Studebaker but they end up 1500 miles in the wrong direction to New York (The entire story is only make up in 9 days in total). Here is a story of mother who vanished, a father who passed away and their journey from the prairies of Nebraska to the BIG city in a boxcar on a train with a wanderer named Ulysses. Emmett & Billy just want to retrieve the car & the money that Duchess stole but they keep getting stuck along the way to make it back to California in time for the 4th of July. A long read but you'll be caught with Woolly, Duchess and Sally (I read the book in 6 days) .....

I learned a lot of vocabulary from it!

Amor Towles brings a believable story to life and weaves his subjects thru trials, and adventures, with beautifully descriptive scenes. His ease of bringing Greek classics, the culture of the period, and divergent characters to life is very fulfilling.

The main question all the members asked was “why are the chapters backward?”

So many topics to discuss--redemption and retribution, friendship, character's intentions.

Also, FYI, the Lincoln Highway is Rte. 30

Did not read but will in future,
Eileen Hedrick

Loved it!!!!!

Loved

THE LINCOLN HIGHWAY is the story of a detour from a plan to travel the Lincoln Highway west from Nebraska to California. Of the three books by Amor Towels that Iâ??ve read, RULES OF CIVILITY, A GENTLEMEN IN MOSCOW, and now THE LINCOLN HIGHWAY, this one is by far his best.



After Emmettâ??s stint in jail and his fatherâ??s death, he and his little brother Billy decide to move to California. But after two of Emmett's old bunkmates, Duchess and Wooley, show up, Emmett and Billy have to first take them to New York, in the opposite direction. And this is their story, an adventure told by each one of them, plus some chapters told by Emmett's and Billyâ??s friend, Sally.



I loved their different perspectives of the same situations, I loved their dialogue, and I loved Towlesâ?? humor. Every bit of this is unpredictable, especially the end.



What a pleasure this book is! Its only negative is Towlesâ?? lack of quotation marks, which I think is rude to the reader.

The Lincoln Highway is a winding road, alright! Amazing read!

Loved it. Favorite summer read
Story of 2 brothers and 2 “friends” that embark on a journey. Young brother is autistic. Friends are not good people

A young man is released early from a work camp where he was sent after accidentally killing another youth. His father has died and the farm he was raised on was foreclosed. His mother is long gone. All that is left is hos eight year old brother. They decide to head to California, leaving Nebraska, in order to start a new life. Things get sidetracked when two other men from the work camp turn up at his door. So begins a story of errors made and the consequences that follow.
This story is well written and hard to put down. I have enjoyed the other novels by this author and this did not disappoint.

I really liked how the author wrote from the different perspectives of the characters.and how the characters were developed. Billy was my favorite.. Such an adventure and kept me turning the pages. Wooly was also a character I cheered for and was sad how it ended for him.

It needed a prologue: “here are 10 days…”. I had no idea why the chapters were numbered from 10 to 1. Therefore, confusing. Also so many characters thrown in all at once…