Roadside Ron
In the novel Roadside Ron, the narrator tells a compelling story of leaving his wife and children in Chicago after a painful divorce and settling in a small town in Southern California. Living alone in an old van parked next to a service station where he works as a mechanic, Ron, now in his forties, saves enough money to buy a nearly new Harley-Davidson motorcycle, which would eventually take him on an intriguing trip to New York and back.
John, the owner of the service station where Ron works, be-comes almost a father-figure in Ron's life. But his new girlfriend Billy Jo is really his main interest, even though her father thinks of Ron as "biker trash." So does Jerry, a fellow they try to avoid at the pool hall on weekends, who thinks he deserves Billy Jo more than Ron.
But Billy Jo's main problem is Gloria, the beautiful girl in New York whom Ron knows only through e-mail and whom he plans to visit when he rides across the country on his Harley.
On that three-week trip, Ron first meets "Maddog", a strong and massive biker who travels to Indiana with him. Then when Ron tracks down Gloria at her expensive home in New York, he is faced with a situation he hadn't expected.
Roadside Ron is a captivating story and portrays the narrator as an honest, compassionate motorcyclist who struggles to fulfill three life-long dreams. But to some readers, he might appear a bit melodramatic when he threatens Jerry with a pistol, and later when he protects Gloria from her adversary.
This story was Ron Cox's first novel, and although some of the dialogue might seem redundant, repeating what readers would assume for themselves, the overall tale is quite absorbing.
Roadside Ron was published by Cox Publishing in 1997, and its website is WWW.RONCOXPUB.COM in San Diego, California.