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A review by donnasbookaddiction
Driving the King by Ravi Howard
3.0
Usually after reading a novel, I wait a few days afterward to let the characters marinate in my head and reflect on the scenes that the story created for me to see. However, this story didn’t stay with me. It was a good story as I listened (Audio), but the characters went away quickly. Leaving me with the feeling that his writing and storytelling wasn’t at it’s very best.
“Driving the King” is a novel that should be classified as more of a piece of literary fiction than a historical account of the Jim Crow south during the civil rights movement era. It is really the story of a fictional character, Nat Weary, the protagonist whom is sent to prison for 10 years of hard labor after saving Nat King Cole from a racist attacker who rushed the stage during a concert in Montgomery and then serves as the singer’s personal driver for a number of years. The author does what should have been done by not focusing on the life of the attacker within his novel. Nat King Cole is more or less a minor character in this novel.
Readers should be aware it is fiction inspired by fact and not an accurate chronology of Nat King Cole's life. He brings together fact and fiction and changes the particulars of the latter to suit his timeline and the creation of the fictional character of Nathaniel Weary. I can accept that Howard took liberties to exaggerate the historical account of Nat King Cole and other historical characters.
Howard touches on the bus boycott of Alabama. He lightly mentions Claudette Colbert (a fifteen-year-old, was the first person arrested for resisting bus segregation in Montgomery, Alabama), in which if you don’t know the history behind this crusader, she was not the chosen one to spear the march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, because she was a young unwed mother. They chose Rosa Parks 9 months later. Howard also strategically inserts other historical characters important to the civil rights movement, including Martin Luther King, Jr. and Almena Lomax, African American journalist and civil rights activist. Rosa Parks. Boxer Dynamite Jackson fought out of Santa Monica, California. He won the Heavyweight Championship of California during his career. It is also reported that he owned a Jazz Club in Los Angeles in the 1940s on Central Avenue called “Dynamite Jackson’s”.
Howard penned about Nat King Cole becoming the first African-American performer to host a variety TV series in 1956. The show originally aired without a sponsor, but NBC agreed to pay for initial production costs; it was assumed that once the show actually aired and advertisers were able to see its sophistication, a national sponsor would emerge. None did; many national companies did not want to upset their customers in the South, who did not want to see a black man on TV shown in anything other than a subservient position. Although NBC agreed to continue footing the bill for the show until a sponsor could be found, star Nat 'King' Cole pulled the plug on it himself in its second season. In the 1956 season, the show had a 15-minute running time. It was expanded to a 30-minute segment in 1957. (IMDB)
Howard’s story was an entertaining novel but not a great one. it suffered from the lack of an intriguing storyline in my view. “Driving the King” didn’t quite live up to its expectations of Nat King Cole and his music or his Jim Crow experiences in real life. However, Howard has a creative narrative, and I look forward to his next book.
“Driving the King” is a novel that should be classified as more of a piece of literary fiction than a historical account of the Jim Crow south during the civil rights movement era. It is really the story of a fictional character, Nat Weary, the protagonist whom is sent to prison for 10 years of hard labor after saving Nat King Cole from a racist attacker who rushed the stage during a concert in Montgomery and then serves as the singer’s personal driver for a number of years. The author does what should have been done by not focusing on the life of the attacker within his novel. Nat King Cole is more or less a minor character in this novel.
Readers should be aware it is fiction inspired by fact and not an accurate chronology of Nat King Cole's life. He brings together fact and fiction and changes the particulars of the latter to suit his timeline and the creation of the fictional character of Nathaniel Weary. I can accept that Howard took liberties to exaggerate the historical account of Nat King Cole and other historical characters.
Howard touches on the bus boycott of Alabama. He lightly mentions Claudette Colbert (a fifteen-year-old, was the first person arrested for resisting bus segregation in Montgomery, Alabama), in which if you don’t know the history behind this crusader, she was not the chosen one to spear the march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, because she was a young unwed mother. They chose Rosa Parks 9 months later. Howard also strategically inserts other historical characters important to the civil rights movement, including Martin Luther King, Jr. and Almena Lomax, African American journalist and civil rights activist. Rosa Parks. Boxer Dynamite Jackson fought out of Santa Monica, California. He won the Heavyweight Championship of California during his career. It is also reported that he owned a Jazz Club in Los Angeles in the 1940s on Central Avenue called “Dynamite Jackson’s”.
Howard penned about Nat King Cole becoming the first African-American performer to host a variety TV series in 1956. The show originally aired without a sponsor, but NBC agreed to pay for initial production costs; it was assumed that once the show actually aired and advertisers were able to see its sophistication, a national sponsor would emerge. None did; many national companies did not want to upset their customers in the South, who did not want to see a black man on TV shown in anything other than a subservient position. Although NBC agreed to continue footing the bill for the show until a sponsor could be found, star Nat 'King' Cole pulled the plug on it himself in its second season. In the 1956 season, the show had a 15-minute running time. It was expanded to a 30-minute segment in 1957. (IMDB)
Howard’s story was an entertaining novel but not a great one. it suffered from the lack of an intriguing storyline in my view. “Driving the King” didn’t quite live up to its expectations of Nat King Cole and his music or his Jim Crow experiences in real life. However, Howard has a creative narrative, and I look forward to his next book.