Turquoise Truck
By Alex Kudera
5/5
()
About this ebook
Alex Kudera's Turquoise Truck gives us a down-on-his-luck car salesman working for a predatory dealership, and how the automobiles they pawn off on unsuspecting customers reveal the stark and ugly consequences of our kill-or-be-killed economic culture. It's a peep through the keyhole of America's economic caste system, and how desperate folks can be to climb that ladder, too often selling their souls as they do. Mendicant Bookworks is proud to release this subtle and subversive tale about the tiny, daily wars waged on the front lines of the American dream.
From the author:
Selling cars got me out of my mother's apartment and turned me into a self-supporting adult. I was 25 years old and had written a lot of fiction since finishing college but hadn't gotten work beyond busboy and bookstore clerk. I could afford to pay my student loan, but that was about it. It's twenty years later, but I'm still grateful for this sales "opportunity" even if it was completely unexpected, maybe the last thing in the world I thought I'd be doing to earn my own way in this life. Today, I'd say that "Turquoise Truck" is about coming to terms with what one has to do to survive in capitalist America, and about how ugly it can feel when earning daily bread requires getting people to pay top dollar for merchandise they may not be able to afford. It's something I still wrestle with. Quite obviously a commission-based car salesperson cannot tell the customers not to buy cars but to instead safely invest their money in a house or low-fee index mutual fund. Now that I teach college classes, I'm removed from the front lines of capitalist America although I still find myself apprehensive about the economics of the consumer transaction. There are days on college campuses when the corporate university feels like a shadier place than the car lot. But again, you can't tell out-of-state students to go back home, live with their parents, and do a couple years at the local community college before transferring to a school where they can pay in-state tuition. In fact, as in "Turquoise Truck," over the years, I've learned that people don't like being told what to do, and they respond positively when we show agreement or enthusiasm with choices they have made. For example, the narrator of the story sees how sad the customer gets when he thinks the toy will be taken away. So that is the story and that is often the story in America: sometimes the moral or ethical communications do not lead to happiness, and we feel obliged to "give the people what they want."
In addition to delivering automobiles, Alex Kudera has sold books, waited tables, taught school, tutored English, walked dogs, washed dishes, and leased apartments. Fight For Your Long Day (Atticus Books), his first novel, was drafted in a walk-in closet during a summer in Seoul, South Korea and consequently won the 2011 IPPY Gold Medal for Best Fiction from the Mid-Atlantic Region. Other publications include Frade Killed Ellen (Dutch Kills Press) and Over Fifty Billion Kafkas Served (Orizont Literar Contemporan). His forthcoming books include Auggie's Revenge, a comic crime novel from Beating Windward Press, and a teaching edition of Fight for Your Long Day is to be published in fall 2016. Alex currently teaches literature and writing at Clemson University in South Carolina.
Alex Kudera
Alex Kudera has survived fifteen years of teaching overloads but in some circles is better known for his mysterious injuries. He has bussed dishes and tutored English in two countries, and Fight for Your Long Day, his first novel, was drafted in a walk-in closet during a summer in Seoul, South Korea. A lifelong Philadelphian until fall 2007, Alex currently teaches literature and writing at Clemson University in South Carolina.
Related to Turquoise Truck
Related ebooks
Bad Drive Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Safe Of Old Lies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Big Get-Even Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Regression: The Sharon Hayes Detective Series, #2 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGeorgia Rolling Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMaynard Soloman vs. The Kidney Thieves (Funny Detective Stories #8) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGambit: An Urban Fantasy Novel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLeaving Grangeville - Take a Journey Down the Broken Road Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Financial Lives of the Poets: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hired By Billionaire Boss Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsJust Jake: Reynolds Family, #5 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFinal Crossing Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBetween Death and a Hard Place Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRide Me Hard: The Devil's Host MC, #1 Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Cider Country Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Taxi Chronicles Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIn The Wind... (on a Friday Morning) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHer Passion (A Contemporary Interracial Romance): UnReal Marriage, #2 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNever Could Stop: Tasting Never, #7 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Never Could Stop Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThank You Enough: Becker Family Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsKade: Bad Boy Billionaire: Miles Brothers Romance, #2 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAll Sales Final Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDream Noir and Other Tales Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDizzy: Steel Bones Motorcycle Club Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Sold: A Collection of Short Stories Only a Closer Could Love Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMeet My Crazy: Vol. 1 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSpyder Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDream Lover & Other Tales Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNo Time Like the Present Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
General Fiction For You
The Covenant of Water (Oprah's Book Club) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Priory of the Orange Tree Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Man Called Ove: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Alchemist Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Silmarillion Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Cloud Cuckoo Land: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Fellowship Of The Ring: Being the First Part of The Lord of the Rings Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Unhoneymooners Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Cabin at the End of the World: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dante's Divine Comedy: Inferno Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The City of Dreaming Books Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Shantaram: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Life of Pi: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Dark Tower I: The Gunslinger Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Jackal, Jackal: Tales of the Dark and Fantastic Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Beyond Good and Evil Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The King James Version of the Bible Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Pet Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Dry: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Labyrinth of Dreaming Books: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Ocean at the End of the Lane: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Second Life of Mirielle West: A Haunting Historical Novel Perfect for Book Clubs Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Everything's Fine Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Alchemist: A Graphic Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Canterbury Tales Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Beartown: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Anonymous Sex Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Nettle & Bone Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Turquoise Truck
1 rating0 reviews
Book preview
Turquoise Truck - Alex Kudera
Turquoise Truck
By Alex Kudera
Copyright 2015 Mendicant Bookworks
Smashwords Edition, Liscense Notes
Thank you for your purchase. This ebook is licensed for your personal use, and it may not be re-sold or given away. If you're reading an unlicensed copy, please respect the both author’s and publisher’s copyright and notify the publisher or smashwords immediately. This ebook may not be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
Contact the publisher via at:
mendicantbookworks@gmail.com
Cover Design by Ryan Bradley
Turquoise Truck
"Today, we’re gonna fight back. Today we’re gonna be on our guard. Joe and Barry, you guard the front entrance. Rizzo and Daryl, you get the back. Marky, take the side door and don’t let me see you smokin’ out there. Smokin’s for losers and today we’re gonna win. Today is the day when nobody gets out alive. Today is the day we don’t take prisoners. Don’t let me catch you handing out polite smiles and business cards. We do deliveries only. You breathe, you ride. I see one of you scumbags let down your guard, and the whole team collapses. Capiche? Today, we stand guard, we wait, and when they come, and believe me when I say they’re gonna come, we sell cars."
As a Sales and Leasing Consultant for Father and Son Automobile, I’ve heard it all before. Fat Sal Scali gives the same