Book Description:
A tragic story of lives that interconnect at a roadside dinerin the wilds of Northern Ontario. The desolation of the landscapeis mirrored in the truck stop. Oppression, abuse and alcoholism have left their indelible marks a tableaux of evil, perdition, the fall from grace, and the hope of redemption. And acting as soundtrack to it all is the rattle and hum of the highway of humanity oily, smelly, loud and deadly, it giveth and it taketh away.In the wilds of northern Ontario, 40 something Betty operates a roadside diner with the help of her oppressive, spirit killing husband and occasional visits from her genuinely evil son. A drifter with an abusive past of his own passes through their lives, causing Betty to reconnect with her long dead emotions. Betty was once Elizabeth, the daughter of a refined mother and an ambitious father. Financial ruin brought about her father's suicide and her mother's descent into alcoholism. Betty bears the scars, and struggles to remain human, though others around her have failed.Sal is a wanderer hermit who lives in the woods near Betty's Diner. His mother was an alcoholic who lived with a cruel drunk. Harry was physically and verbally abusive to Sal and his mother while Sal was growing up and the scars run deep. Sal's only salvation was the occasional trip to a movie theatre to see Elvis, waiting for the movieto start, waiting for the chance to get away from Harry. Sal and Betty find each other in their mutual need hers to give to someone who will receive, his to get from someone the caring that he only got brief glimpses of from his destroyed mother.Their connection may ultimately save them from their tragic worlds of pain.
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