The Dark Wob

Taking a leaf (boo) out of Motor Sport magazine I thought it would be quite cultured of us to have a bookworm's corner. A noisy table in the library, if you like.....

I'll kick off with a brief one or two and come back and add later if I remember.

"Overdrive" by Leslie Waller

American (yeah, sorry again) tale of high school love and rivalry set in the context of a Car Club rally. Nice engaging descriptions of the cars and small-town garage - most of the stuff is European but there is a girl in a Corvair. Predictable TV-film type of plot but a good read for the narrative.


I imagine many of us are familiar with the works of James Leasor, he wrote a series of "Jason Love" thrillers but also a set of novels centring upon the international tanglements of his alter ego from "Aristo Autos" - a mews vintage dealer of the 1960s. Full of literary stocking tops, cleavages, gunpoint negotiations but best of all, authoritative descriptions of the various thoroughbred cars involved in the twists and turns of each plot.


Throw up any relevant fact or fiction that you feel is worthy of our time.....

John Steinbeck included various interesting bits about repairing cars in his books.

eg. in The Grapes of Wrath they replaced a piston by using thin copper wire to compress the rings.

Ben

Yes that was a good story. A Hudson Super Six if I remember correctly, a proper old banger.

fried onions wrote: ↑Sat Mar 20, 2021 8:58 pm Yes that was a good story. A Hudson Super Six if I remember correctly, a proper old banger.

He also included Model T tinkering in other books.

Ben

Coleman's Cars by John Coleman is a good read, it is essentially his life story with cars from the 1950's to about the early 2000's. He also wrote Coleman's Drive which gives an account of his journey up through South America and the Andes to New York in an Austin Seven and although I haven't read this believe it is more of a travelogue. Coleman's Cars is certainly a good easy reading nostalgia trip, the gentleman passed away about 10 years ago at the wheel of his Morris Minor, after always saying he didn't want to die in a Minor.

SPEED SIX!, Bruce Carter 1972

Ben

Backfire. Motoring diaries by Alan Clark. A good engaging read.

Jupiter's Travels & the one that came after that I've forgotten the name of, riding around the world on an old Triumph as it falls apart under him.

Marathon in the Dust, Innes Ireland. The story of a London to Sydney rally in a Merc by one of the drivers.

Armour plated Saab 900 Turbo.

RS Turbo driving serial killer and also features a total weirdo who drives a Nissan Stanza.