Long, long ago, in a gas station far, far away, you drove up to the pump and a bell rang. A squad of smartly uniformed young men scurried out, and the work commenced. They pumped your gas, checked your water and oil, washed and squeegeed your windshield, and checked the air in your tires, while you relaxed in your car. You didn’t have to lift a finger.
Route 66 was constructed in the 1920s. Bobby Troup wrote the song lyrics in the 1940s, and by the 1960s, the Mother Road had taken on mythic proportions, becoming the best-known highway in the country. A TV series took its name and sent two young men on adventures down the road. Rock stars recorded Troup’s song. For me, growing up in Southern California, Route 66 represented the appeal of the open road, the wide open spaces of the West, and the pull of days gone by. So when I looked for a setting for a retro-themed suspense novel, it was natural for me to follow the yellow-striped road.
It was fun to once again join mystery writer Tracy Eaton and her quirky family on one of their adventures in Kris Neri's latest book in this series, Revenge On Route 66. Tracy Eaton is a mystery writer who always seems to get involved in real murders, and half the time they involve someone in her interesting and unusual family, such as her movie star father Alec Grainger.
We had one of those vacations that you rarely hear about these days. The flight from San Francisco to Phoenix was tolerable, almost pleasant, even though I was chosen for an inside-out photo op by security.
We spent one night in Phoenix and then we hit the road north to Sedona and her beautiful “other worldly” red rock formations. Along the way we stopped at Montezuma’s Castle National Park where we were awestruck by the 1000 year-old ruins of the Sinaqua people.
