Hell on Wheels

LONG HAUL--A. I. Bezzerides--Carrick & Evans ($2).

At night along U. S. highways travelers sometimes see a dozen huge trucks parked around a filling station or a roadside restaurant, the drivers sleeping in their cabs, drinking coffee or talking shop. If they listen to these men, they can hear stories of the true nomads of the American working class--of drivers who virtually live in their trucks, drive 30 hours without sleep, travel the roads for weeks without getting to bed. Last week a 29-year-old California truck driver summoned up some of this strange nocturnal life on wheels in a brief first novel.

Born in Turkey, of Greek and Armenian parents, Albert Isaac Bezzerides reached the U. S. when he was nine months old, grew up on his father's farm near Fresno, was a champion quarter-miler in high school. Unable to pronounce his name ("Buzz-air-uh-dees"), his schoolmates called him Buzzard's Knees. He won a scholarship to the University of California, quit in disgust three months before graduation. Then he settled down to truck driving. When he got married he began to write. Prodded on by his wife, he began selling stories to Story, Scribner's, Esquire. "She's a first-class prodder," says Author Bezzerides.

Long Haul tells the story of Nick and Paul Benay, who picked up loads of freight in Oakland, Calif., hauled them to Los Angeles, fighting sleep, thieving agents, collectors who tried to seize their truck because they were behind in their payments. When they were paid $235 (the agent owed them $400), they bought a load of lemons in Los Angeles, rushed them to Oakland where they sold them, during a temporary shortage that boosted the price, for $520. But, as their luck was looking up, a drunken driver smashed into the truck, nearly killed Paul. Driving alone, hauling pipe to the oil fields, dynamite to Sonora, Nick picked up a girl on the road. He got her a room in Los Angeles, but after driving the 400 miles from Los Angeles to Oakland and back to Los Angeles, he was always so tired when he saw her that she decided he was indifferent. As loads got smaller, hauls longer and tires more worn, the end of Nick's story came closer. Early one morning, after 30 hours of steady driving, Nick suddenly discovered that he could not stop his truck, noticed dreamily that he was going 75 miles an hour downhill. . . .

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