Against the backdrop of the Singer Sewing Company, a novel of phobias, obsessions, a string of motel fires, and a troubled friendship In the early 1980s,Milton Menger, a wealthy art dealer living in New Jersey, is called by an estranged friend, Charles Trembleman, with whom he’s had no contact in years. Charley is a traveling salesman for the Singer Sewing Company and his hands have just been badly burned in a motel fire near Memphis.He needs a driver so he can continue traveling and selling.Milty rises to the occasion.Together they embark on a journey across the South, visiting showrooms and staying in locally owned motels. Is it a coincidence that these motels keep going up in flames?
With a DeLillo-like nostalgia for Americana, combined with the dark humor of a Coen brothers film, Ira Sher’s storytelling draws the reader in like a moth to the flame.