Joan Mackenzie: The Lincoln Highway and Kleptopia

The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles. He wrote a book called A Gentleman in Moscow a few years ago which is really terrific, and I adored this new one. It’s about two brothers and starts in Nebraska in the 1950s. Emmett, the older one is released from a juvenile prison farm where he served time for involuntary manslaughter. They’re on their own with both parents gone and decide to leave the farm and start a new life – but as they’re planning to leave, two guys turn up who were in prison with Emmett and smuggled themselves out in the boot of the car in which he was driven to be released – and proceed to lead them on a merry old dance, which turns into an epic road and rail trip all the way to NYC. 
Kleptopia by Tom Burgis. This is nonfiction, about the global money go round, and power. Who has it, how do they get it (and hold onto it); what does it take, and how do they get away with corruption on such a blatant and breathtaking scale? Like other books of this type, it’s clear that a ruthless obsession with power, political dominance and unimaginable wealth is a male undertaking. It both fascinated and enraged me. Unbelievable that people manage to get away.
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