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Victor D Lopez
a book bubble about
Hire Lernin’ An Idealist’s Quest Through the Realm of for-Profit Education
Literature & Fiction
Author Insight
The subway ride . . .
If there is a hell, it is probably one interminable NYC subway ride at rush hour. As is true of much of the narrative in this novel, the subway ride depicted actually happened much as described with very little by way of literary license. Many times throughout my life--and every day recently when watching the news or reading a newspaper--I've exclaimed, "If I wrote this in a novel no one would believe it." Alas, truth is indeed stranger than fiction, albeit more so of late. At times, it can make one wonder whether we are all characters in some perverse author's experimental play written with the assistance of dice tosses to suggest plot elements much like a more complicated and less fun version of Dungeons and Dragons that invariably ends in death.
Book Excerpt
Hire Lernin’ An Idealist’s Quest Through the Realm of for-Profit Education
Monday morning Dan showered, changed, had his usual two mugs of coffee and headed out of his apartment by 8:00 a.m. for the five-block walk to the 65th Street subway station to catch the G train to Queens Plaza. After a five-minute wait, he boarded the train for the short ride to Queens Plaza, where he walked across the platform to wait for the E train heading for Manhattan. Five minutes later, he boarded the crowded Manhattan-bound E train and suffered the approximately ten minute ride tightly pressed on all sides by fellow strap hangers—one of whom had obviously had too much garlic in his dinner the previous night or perhaps in his breakfast. Since moving was not an option, Dan tried to lengthen as much as possible the interval between breaths and did his best to inhale only when the other seemed to inhale as well. Immediately behind him, a lovely buxom brunette in a tight-fitting business suit pressed against him doubtless out of necessity rather than choice, but he felt mixed emotions at the warmth of her body against his back and the lingering essence of her expensive perfume. The latter would have been intoxicating but for the incongruous and nauseating odor of the young man’s breath directly in front of him. He began to blush, thinking of his girlfriend and trying hard not to dwell on the beautiful woman behind him whose touch was far from unpleasant—especially when the rocking motion of the subway car and curves along the route caused her to repeatedly rub up quite intimately against him. He wondered whether she was as uncomfortable as he while trying not to think what it might feel like had he chosen to face her way rather than towards the man who seemed to have attempted suicide by garlic overdose—and his blush deepened further at the thought.
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