Drives Like a Dream
A Novel
-
- $19.99
-
- $19.99
Publisher Description
“A hilarious family tale” about a modern-day mother’s lifestyle crisis—and her outlandish attempts to get her family back (Woman’s Day).
Lydia Modine is sixty-one and about to come undone. Her three grown-up children have flown the coop. She hasn’t seen them together in more than a year, and now her ex-husband is about to marry a woman half his age. And the insults keep coming: Lydia is stuck on a book she’s writing about Detroit’s car industry, which uncannily parallels her own life—out with the old model, in with the new. She’s poured her soul into her family, only to be abandoned in the City of Dream Machines. But then a twist of fate introduces her to Norm, an eco-car fanatic out to remake her and the world.
A “smart and funny” novel that’s sure to appeal to anyone who has longed for an alternate life, Drives Like a Dream confirms that sometimes when you set out for a spin, the twists and turns can be perfectly rewarding—and right (Chicago Tribune).
“A beautiful novel.” —The Washington Post
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
After his well-received, quirky 2000 debut, The Obituary Writer, Shreve succumbs to the sophomore slump with a dull and far-fetched follow-up. Cars are in Lydia Modine's blood: her father had worked for Ford, Tucker and GM, she's an expert on his former boss, Preston Tucker, and she still lives right outside a tarnished and crumbling Detroit. Now divorced after 33 years of marriage, Lydia, a "social historian of the automobile," sees too many parallels between herself and the subject of her fifth book: " 'planned obsolescence.' Out with the old, in with the new." In the wake of her ex-husband Cy's wedding to a younger woman, 61-year-old Lydia is desperate to escape her sense of loss and restore a sense of family with her three grown children. Shreve's considerable historical research is obvious and admirable, but unless the reader is fascinated by the car industry, it will seem like overkill. Leads that could have been interesting remain unpursued, while an unlikely relationship between Lydia and Cy's new in-laws is developed. Also unlikely is Lydia's scheme to lure her children back home, which borders on the slapstick. Shreve shows promise with some strong character writing, but erratic storytelling, a hasty conclusion and a surfeit of auto lore stall the tale.
