Call Me a Cab

published 2026-07-14 | tags: #backlog #books

Call Me a Cab was a suggestion by Man Carrying Thing (YouTube) and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Of the books that Man Carrying Thing recommends I can't say for certain why this book was the first one I actually cracked open, but I can speculate. First, I've wanted to get into crime novels and this is labeled as such on every website about it -- ironically there is no crime (at least not in a meaningful way like you would expect from the "Crime Novel" genre. Second, the cover is very pulp-novel coded, which is interesting for a novel released in 2022! Finally, it's got a pretty lady on the front in a striking pose, I won't deny that sex sells.

Anyway I'm really glad I did start reading this! It was written in the 70s and only just now published posthumously, so it's a period piece? (Is it a period piece if it's set in modern day... when it was written?)

I also really like road-trip novels. I also enjoyed I'm Starting to Worry About This Black Box of Doom which is also a road-trip novel -- almost identical actually:

Woman calls a local taxi/uber ride driven by mediocre nobody Woman then decides/reveals she needs a ride across the country

Both books also, ultimately at least, have very low stakes. Call me a Cab is just about a woman deciding if she wants to marry her boyfriend and needing more time to think and make her decision.

Along the way you get these little vignettes. The weird anxious guy at the Motel whose bed won't stop vibrating, the couple who need to get to the ER to deliver their baby, a one-night stand with a bartender. These little stories make it a 50/50 split between a fast-friends story and a collection of short stories.

I also think road trip novels show you what makes the country so wonderful. Yeah, our politicians are garbage, our policies are backward, it's hard to survive, but we've got good people and a diversity of them.

This quote keeps going around, usually attributed to "some european visiting for the world cup":

if you want to hate America, watch the news. If you want to love America, drive across it

And I think that sums it up pretty well.