How is that I’ve never read “Damnation Alley” by Zelazny?

I’ve got a confession to make. No matter how much I loved reading sci-fi, playing Car Wars, and watching sci-fi films I have — to this day — never read Roger Zelazny’s Damnation Alley*. It’s one of those books I was always “going to get around to,” but then decades passed and it’s suddenly 2015. 2015? The novel is close to 50-years old and I haven’t read it? That’s inexcusable!

Today, way too long after I should have stepped up and handled this problem, I take action and finally read the book. I’ve got a paperback copy of Damnation Alley* to shove in my backpack, a three-hour flight, and I’m going to do everything I can to not work on the flight and instead read a book.

This won’t be easy. All too often I find flights one of the best times to work, and it’s not at all unusual for dozens of emails to fire off to the world once I reach land and internet access. But, when I force myself, flights can also be a great time to read. On the flight home Sunday I was reading Harvard Business Review’s Creating Business Plans*, but for today’s flight I think I’ll switch gears and enjoy a novel.

Is it irresponsible of me to use a three-hour flight to read a novel? Probably. But I could use the time to decompress and recover before I jump into a constant stream of meetings.

Check the Wikipedia entry to learn more about the book.

Hell Tanner isn’t the sort of guy you’d mistake for a hero: he’s a fast-driving car thief, a smuggler, and a stone-cold killer. He’s also expendable – at least in the eyes of the Secretary of Traffic for the Nation of California. Tanner doesn’t care much for those eyes. You’d also never mistake Hell Tanner for a humanitarian. Facing life in prison for his various crimes, he’s given a choice; rot away his remaining years in a tiny jail cell, or drive cross-country and deliver a case of antiserum to the plague-ridden people of Boston, Massachusetts…

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