Notes From The Midnight Driver

The novel opens on Alex choosing to get drunk and drive to his father’s in order to get revenge. Alex’s parents are recently divorced after his father starts to date Alex’s third-grade teacher. After crashing his mother’s car into a garden gnome, a very drunk Alex is taken into the police station and then transferred to the hospital with a concussion and alcohol poisoning. Alex’s mother grounds him for a month, until a judge punishes him with 100 hours of community service at the nursing home where Alex’s mother works.

Alex is assigned to spend his 100 hours with Mr. Solomon Lewis, or Sol, a cranky elderly man with emphysema. Over the early hours of Alex’s time with Sol, Alex struggles to understand Sol’s intense sarcasm and speech peppered with Yiddish phrases. Meanwhile, Alex deals with his awkwardness at school and struggles to understand his budding feelings for his best friend, Laurie, a beautiful, athletic girl who hides her figure beneath goth clothing.

The novel moves towards conflict as Alex tries to do something nice for Sol by throwing a benefit concert. Alex’s weaknesses as a musician are exposed and he struggles with insecurity and a lack of emotional maturity.