An irresistible comic novel about a quixotic door-to-door salesman and his teenage son--with cameo appearances by Mr. Clean, James Dean, and Miss North Carolina 1970. Ever since Gabe Strickland can remember, his father, Roman, has believed in the sale: in that magical moment on the customer's porch, the deal about to close. Everything, claims Roman, has its price--be it Bible, lawn chair, or household cleaner. And the next opportunity to get rich lies just around the corner. But with every success comes an equally memorable failure, and Gabe's mother, Gladys, is tired of waiting for a life where the bills get paid on time. Thus in the summer of 1975 she leaves Roman for his brother Dutch, a wealthy car dealer as steady as Roman is unpredictable. Confident he can find a way to win Gladys back, Roman recruits sixteen-year-old Gabe into one outlandish scheme after another, culminating in a barnstorming tour of carnivals and state fairs in which Roman, Gabe, financier Vic Comstock, and Dutch's beauty-queen ex-wife, Sandy Goforth, sell tickets to see the Death Cars of Celebrities up close. In this funny, poignant novel, full of richly drawn characters and everyday insanity, Gabe finds his own truth somewhere between Roman's dreaming and Gladys's stability; and he realizes that love is, ultimately, the one thing that can't be bought or sold.
- ISBN10 0393049299
- ISBN13 9780393049299
- Publish Date 21 June 2000
- Publish Status Inactive
- Out of Print 21 August 2012
- Publish Country US
- Imprint WW Norton & Co
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 352
- Language English