Whipping Post is about an ordinary truck driver who is at his wit's end due to forces appearing out of his control. Uneducated and emotional, yet hard-working, and seemingly always behind the proverbial eight ball, he sets into motion a series of events leading to tragic consequences.
In the process of this heartrending story, real facts concerning the trucking industry are presented to the reader, giving insight into the world of the over-the-road trucker. Although he does take some drastic action, the main character is really not that different from the average truck driver running up and down the highways of this country.
Excerpt from Whipping Post
CHAPTER 1
The
solid oak door split open with a startling crash. It slammed against
the back wall with such violent force that it bounced shut just as the
trespasser stepped partially through the entryway. With a vicious boot,
he punted it again and splintered the bottom section of what had once
been a splendid antique four-paneled door. Sprung from its hinges and
shattered from its grandeur, the door swayed limply in defeat.
Startled, Graham Crane jumped to his feet and fumbled with his
red-rimmed Pravda bifocals. He tried to make sense of the situation
escalating before him. Light flooded through the entrance and made it
difficult to clearly discern the features of the individual who hulked
in the doorway. However, Crane could clearly make out the
shotgun with its menacing barrel pointed at his midsection. He also saw a
look of abject horror on Frannie Weinstein's face, his secretary of the
past thirty-two years. She stood in her office, and cowered just to the
right of the intruder's shoulder, screaming for him to stop. "Mr. Crane, I tried to stop him!" Frannie shrieked, as if she could have
really done anything. At sixty-eight years old and weighing
one-hundred-two pounds, it was doubtful she could have stopped an unruly
child, much less this mountain of a man who crashed into the normally
tranquil legal suite.
Alan N. Webber lives in Clifton, IL with his wife
of thirty-one years. He has four grown children and five grandchildren. The son and grandson of former truckers, Alan has
spent his entire fifty-four years on the planet in and around the
transportation industry. After graduating from high school, he attended the
local junior college while immersing himself further in the trucking business. There is no task in the transportation business
Alan hasn't done: from greasing trucks to running the company. His load of transportation experience even includes a
two-year stint at being a truck driving man, primarily hauling steel and water
heaters. Currently, he is
the president of A.N.Webber, Inc., a family-owned nationwide trucking and
logistics firm based in Kankakee, IL. They operate two hundred trucks and have
terminals in four states. Whipping Post is Alan's first venture into the writer's world of
publication. Much like John Grisham writes a fictional story wrapped around the
legal profession, Alan has written a story around the trucking industry,
putting a human face behind the big rigs you see -- and cuss -- going down the
highway. This novel is written by a trucker, with over thirty-seven years of
daily trucking experience who can put pen to paper; rather than by an author
trying to be a trucker for a month from a passenger seat. Alan has works
in progress similar to Whipping Post Alan hopes you like it . . . his mother did!
Reviews, Endorsements, and Blurbs
"In Whipping Post, by Alan N. Webber, truck driver Tim Harrison loves his job. He sits above the traffic in his aging cab-over truck and watches the country slide past the large window. He’s seen it all, from corner to corner, and the long hours of his nomad’s life have taught him the value of self-sufficiency and perseverance. Harrison knows life on the road is hard on his family, but the road is all he knows.
Hard work, justice, and the other values of the road don’t teach him how to handle the loss of his wife Amy through a divorce, his son Jeremy’s brutal beating at the hands of Amy’s new boyfriend Andy Barnes, or a court system that puts an abuser back on the street simply because he has a slick lawyer named Graham Crane. As the miles go by, Harrison has time to think; more than most people, in fact. While the outcome of his plan is hazy, he decides that since the court system failed his son, it’s his duty to teach Barnes and Crane hard lessons about justice.
Whipping Post is a bluntly realistic story about men addicted to violence, alcohol, drugs, and rage. It is also a heartbreaking story about how easily home, family, and truth are undone by men's addictions. Webber paints the world of biker bars, truck stops, and the road itself with a fine-tipped brush. These worlds live and breathe and are real on the page as readers see them from the diverse perspectives of Barnes, Crane, Harrison, and others.
The plot is relentless. There are unexpected twists, turns, and revelations. Everyone’s life in Whipping Post seems "too broke to fix" even though the characters, love 'em and hate 'em, know no other way to live and believe taking a beating is just as normal as breathing and watching the rest of the world fly past their large windows."
--Malcolm R. Campbell, Garden of Heaven: an Odyssey
“Whipping Post is a book so beautifully written you want to hang onto every word. Webber has created a flawless novel filled with poignancy and characters that are seemingly real. On some level all readers can relate to the plight of protagonist Tim Harrison as he is on a mission to right the wrong the justice system has bequeathed on his young son. This is a special story of love, redemption and universal emotion.”
