Product Description

A Simple Vote Could Mean Deadly Consequences

There's no trouble like a road...

In all the years Joe Esterhouse has served on the board of supervisors for Wardsville, North Carolina, never has a single piece of paper caused so much trouble. But after he reads it aloud at a meeting, this quiet little community will nearly be torn apart.

It's a simple invitation to complete the long-delayed Gold River Highway project but behind it are the reek of corruption and the shadow of something even more dangerous. With millions at stake in land and development deals--and millions to be lost for those in the road's way--everyone has something at stake.

As neighbor turns on neighbor, the weight of the decision falls on the members of the Wardsville board. Their vote will determine the fate of the project and the future of the town. But when someone may have gone as far as cold-blooded murder, is anyone safe?

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1097142 in Books
• Published on: 2009-03-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 352 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780764206580
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

From Publishers Weekly
In his savvy sophomore suspense novel, former indie bookseller Robertson (The Heir) uses multiple points of view to set up a seemingly innocuous story line—the proposal to build a road—that will keep readers glued. Octogenarian Joe Esterhouse has served enough decades on the Jefferson County, NC., Board to smell a rat, and something disturbs him about a proposal to bring Gold River Highway over the mountain into tiny Wardsville. Board members are dying and nothing is what it seems on the surface. Self-interest threatens to override the common good, and what is truth and what is perceived to be truth become nebulous. Robertson creates some of the most engaging characters and relationships encountered in faith fiction: Joe is a genuine sage, and other characters are no less captivating. Although the rapid-fire point of view changes are reminiscent of a novice stick-shift driver (and threaten whiplashlike confusion early on), once readers get the rhythm they will be compelled along. This top-notch offering features genuine humor, clever writing, a surprise ending and a strong portrayal of evil's power that doesn't succumb to clichéd violence. It deserves a wide audience. (Apr.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review
"... a novel about a road--and murder, suspense, and intrigue--that is at turns funny, engaging, and thoroughly engrossing." -- 5MinutesforBooks.com

"Robertson's descriptions and dialogue speak with authority.... Road to Nowhere is a really well-written story." -- Jae Anderson, 1340MagBooks.com

"genuine humor, clever writing, a surprise ending and a strong portrayal of evil's power that doesn't succumb to clichéd violence." -- Publishers Weekly

From the Back Cover
"This top-notch offering features genuine humor, clever writing, a surprise ending and a strong portrayal of evil's power that doesn't succumb to cliched violence. It deserves a wide audience." --Publishers Weekly Most small towns would kill for a new highway. In the quiet burg of Wardsville, someone might have gone that far when shady deals and high-reaching corruption arrive with the announcement of what may just be a Road to Nowhere

Customer Reviews

A Book About a Road? Yes!


Road to Nowhere

You know someone is a talented author when he can write a novel about a road and make it a page-turner. Paul Robertson has done just that.

A small county made up of small towns, mere blips on the state map, situated miles from everywhere else suddenly receives the possibility of a chance to connect, change and grow. A road. This opportunity lands in the lap of the county government members and the folks in their jurisdiction soon make their wishes and demands known.

Who is behind the road? Does someone feel strongly enough about it to kill? What is the right decision?

I read this novel with the same sense of wonder I felt watching the interactions of the 12 Angry Men. Road to Nowhere is a fascinating glimpse into the thoughts and triggers and behaviors of people caught up in a cause. It is also a finely crafted novel nothing like his other impressive work, The Heir.

Road to Nowhere led to a wonderful surprise.
Paul Robertson has created a great tale. I was caught up after reading the first page of 'Road To Nowhere' and could hardly put it down.

It is a wonderful story of a small town at perhaps it's best and most assuredly at it's worst.

Who would have thought that a simple plan to build a road could destroy a town before the bulldozers even get started! Or even get a man killed?

'Road To Nowhere' is told from the point of view of each of the city board members. We get to see the various sides of the story as it unfolds and it unfolds at a rapid pace.

I am glad to have read this and will be looking up more of Paul Robertson's work.

enthralling small town lives vs. big city plans
I'm not a reader of "Christian" literature. But Robertson doesn't make faith an anvil to drop in this story, but rather a subtle theme of spirituality that is reasonably present in a small North Carolina town in the mountains.

Robertson is skilled at depicting characters through dialogue, and the members of the board of the town council (referred to by one character as "tribal elders") are all indelibly unique character portraits. The friendly hairdresser, the taciturn farmer, the wishy-washy insurance salesman, the greedy real estate developer ... these and other characters quickly come to show more shades and nuances that transcend the potential for cliche.

When the prospect of a new road divides the town members into warring camps, the question of right and wrong begins to guide everyone's actions. And each character's moral strength is put to the test further when two deaths of Town Council members turn out to be murder. But what to do with a Sheriff who won't investigate, engineers who don't think the road is feasible, doctors and coroners and other pillars of the small society all ending up in opposition to each other?

Robertson uses various rhythmic patterns to shift from character to character, showing the council members at home with their spouses, all simultaneously having their various dinners, or (in a memorable sequence) the thoughts of a congregation all in their own worlds during a sermon.

I was worried when one of the non-Christian characters had the potential to become a town pariah, and while she does undergo a conversion of sorts in her beliefs by the end of the story, her changes are subtle and experience-based, and she does not turn out to be the killer (as she might in a more lurid and simplistic tale).

The question isn't really ultimately who did it, but why, and other questions such as the nature of good and evil, fear of and hope for progress, adaptability and familial warfare across generations, all play a role in this engrossing tale. While cliche's occur (a fire and a flood feature at different points, both telegraphed with unsubtle foreshadowing) it is the simple decency of many of those elders, trying to do their best for their unruly constituents, that makes this story memorable and convincing as a portrait of a Southern town where the unfamiliar is so unusual as to trigger dangerous reactions.

Larger politics and alternate lifestyles don't figure into the story at all, which I suppose is sort of a trope of this genre: the most we get is a shared belief by all characters in the corruption of Raleigh (as the state's governmental center) and of most government officials. But the focus stays on the local plot at hand, for as Chairman Joe repeats in a refrain, "Ain't no trouble like a road."