A once
best-selling novelist, arrogant and self-centered, is forced by his publishing
contract to publicize his new work, starting with a one-week book tour along
the West Coast.
Christopher
Lathom was a young man when his first book, universally hailed as a
masterpiece, first appeared. It was so successful, in fact, that he has been
living off the royalties for the past thirty years until eventually he was
forced to sell off his own papers to survive and write.
Now he is
largely forgotten. Living in a coastal town in California, he has become
somewhat of a recluse, hanging out in coffee shops and bars; not quite
rejecting the world, but having no real use for it either.
Finally,
with the help of a substantial advance, Lathom has completed his second novel.
He is quite confident that the public will think it worth the wait and he will
again be the toast of the literary world.
Leery of
both bookstores and fans, Lathom is steadfast in his refusal to take the publicity
journey laid out for him. But events beyond anyone’s control ultimately render
going on a road trip a better idea than staying put.
The author
is assigned a young, studious media escort to drive him up and down the west
coast of the USA. It will soon become the book tour from hell.
Poor attendance
and a series of screw-ups render the writer—already petrified to be outside his
ritual comforts—humiliated and desolate. This is exacerbated by an
unexpected frivolous lawsuit brought against him by an unscrupulous serial
litigant.
They are
joined along the way by Jasmine, the niece of an executive from Lathom’s
publisher. She seems wise beyond her years, but to Lathom she is just one more
indignity that he must endure.
As the disastrous,
often comical, odyssey continues, the author is convinced he cannot continue
the tour—or his life.
He is at his
wit’s end, but is soon to realize that the path to personal redemption is
offered by his two young companions, if he can accept it and overcome his fears
and regrets.
Jasmine
suggests a mystical path, combined with a more spiritual approach to living.
The media
escort hopes to become a writer and turns to Lathom to give him direction. But
when he inadvertently reveals a secret of his own, it is Lathom who must
contemplate a way forward.
This is a
road-trip of unrelenting conflict and surprising twists and turns. Can the
novelist Christopher Lathom become the hero of his own story or is he just a
remnant of past glory?
