“Ah, but, two hours of pushin’ broom
Buys an eight by twelve four-bit room
I’m a man of means by no means
King of the road.”
–Roger Miller
Paul Hemphill wrote King of the Road in 1989 as a tribute to his father. The novel tells the tale of Jake Hawkins, a 70-year old truck driver that takes his young son out on the road with him. His friends tell him he should retire, but Jake decides to make one last glorious haul from Alabama to Nevada.
Harry Crews wrote this about King of the Road: “Here’s a tale that starts in the gut but ultimately comes to live in the heart. I love the old man at the center of King of the Road. I love his courage, his spirit, and his determination to live his life listening only to the dictates of his own blood. Paul Hemphill is and has been for a long time one of the best reads in the country. Put your money down and pick up this book. You’ll not be sorry.”
Johnny Cash also wrote praise: “Jake Hawkins is a lot like my own dad was, and this book took me home. King of the Road is a southern masterpiece, and one of the finest things I’ve ever read by any writer. I can’t wait to get some copies to give out to my friends.”
Some of Hemphill’s other books include The Nashville Sound, Too Old To Cry, Long Gone, Leaving Birmingham, The Sixkiller Chronicles and The Good Old Boys. Over the last 40 years Hemphill wrote 15 books with a rare degree of experience about truck drivers, baseball, football, roller derby queens, stock car drivers, politicians, journalists, preachers, musicians and bootleggers.
An excerpt from Chapter 17 captures a bit of the book’s spirit: “Minnie sent them on their way with a big breakfast and a hug the next morning, a Saturday, and when they were welcomed to Colorado around nine o’clock, they were in high spirits. Rested, not a cloud in the sky, Redball running like a fresh mount, sun at his back, elevations approaching a cooler 4,000 feet, Jake was humming the tunes of the night before as he exchanged horn blasts and raced with a serpentine Santa Fe freight highballing across the sparse high country of Eastern Colorado…”
King of the Road--a heart-rending read-–ranks as one of Hemphill’s finest works of fiction.
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“The Celebration of the Life & Work of Paul Hemphill” in Insured Beyond The Grave…