Ride of Your Life

In 1964, Eli Spencer drove Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to the airport in a Mercedes-Benz worth more than most houses. By 1982, he was holding his father's hand as he died of a disease that didn't yet have a name.Between those two moments lies the story of three generations of the Spencer family—and secrets that threatened to destroy them all.From the trenches of World War I to the back seat of the world's most expensive car, the Spencers built the American Dream one careful step at a time. Ben Spencer Sr. arrived at Ellis Island with nothing but a talent for languages and making Italian sandwiches. His son, Ben Jr., started Cosmopolitan Cars, Manhattan's most exclusive limousine service, with a client list that ranged from Frank Sinatra to the Five Families.But success came at a devastating price.Ben Jr. spent decades hiding his bisexuality in an era when exposure meant ruin—for him, for his business, for his family. His wife Genevieve, haunted by trauma from her own past, descended into depression and pills. And their twin children, Eli and Connie, grew up watching their parents' marriage corrode beneath the weight of unspoken truths.When Genevieve chooses St. Patrick's Day, 1963, to slash her wrists in the back of one of Ben's prized limousines, the family fractures. Eli spirals into drinking and self-destruction. Connie annuls her marriage. Ben Jr. finally steps into the light—coming out publicly in 1975 just as the gay liberation movement gains momentum.But liberation has a cost no one could have predicted.As the 1980s dawn, a mysterious illness begins devastating New York's gay community. Ben Jr., now openly living as a gay man, becomes one of the first victims of what will eventually be called AIDS. And Eli, having finally found sobriety and purpose, must become the caregiver his father once was for him—watching the man who gave him everything waste away in a hospital ward that doesn't yet understand what's killing its patients.Told in a rich, non-linear narrative spanning 1918 to 1993, Ride of Your Life explores the impossible choices families make to survive: the truths we bury, the lies we tell ourselves, and the secrets that shape generations. It's a novel about ambition and sacrifice, love and identity, and the question at the heart of the American Dream—what are you willing to hide to get what you want?Perfect for readers who loved the emotional complexity of A Little Life, the multigenerational sweep of Pachinko, and the intimate family dynamics of The Dutch House.Ride of Your Life is a devastating and ultimately hopeful story about the reality of The American Dream.