Lloyd McNeil's Last Ride

by Will Leitch ★★★★☆

It started with headaches. Lloyd McNeil was generally healthy, but when persistent and increasingly blinding headaches started to plague him, he made an off-the-books visit to his friend Dr. Lipsey. After an MRI, he's invited back to hear the results. "Well, Lloyd, I gotta tell you...it ain't good."

"Glioblastoma, Dr. Lipsey would explain, is a brain tumor. 'But that doesn't quite do it justice,' he said. Here I had been my whole life thinking that the worst thing that could happen to you would be that you'd get a brain tumor. Apparently there was a word that rendered the term brain tumor insufficient."

The prognosis is dire. The tumor is inoperable and rapidly growing. Lloyd has a few months left, at best, during which he will significantly and rapidly decline. Lloyd's circle of people he's close to is small. His parents are dead, and he's divorced, but he's still on good terms with his ex-wife Jessica. They share custody of the center of Lloyd's world, his teenage son Bishop. His job as an Atlanta police officer provides him with dozens of acquaintances, but he's close with only a couple of people on the force. He can't bear to share the news with any of this small circle of loved ones, and so he carries on as if nothing is happening. However, he begins to craft "The Ten Gentle Edicts of Lloyd McNeil", musings on the world that he composes as a leave-behind for his son once Lloyd meets his inevitable demise.

While we ride along with Lloyd on his day-to-day, we start to learn additional things about his life. We learn how Lloyd's own father was a hard-nosed chief of police; how he belittled Lloyd, and how Lloyd could never live up to his expectations. We understand that Lloyd's harsh upbringing has created a burning desire in Lloyd to shower his son with the love he never felt. We also learn that, financially, Lloyd has little in the way of savings to leave behind for Bishop. "Twelve thousand or so in a checking account. Eleven thousand in savings. A house that I can't do anything with that isn't even close to being paid off. And a life insurance policy worth fifty grand...There is not enough. There is not even close to enough."

But then he has an epiphany: if Lloyd is killed in the line of duty, Bishop would receive a lump sum payment of more than $500,000, plus a monthly payout of almost $6,000 per month for the rest of his life. Lloyd has a death sentence, but no one knows about it besides him and Dr. Lipsey, who just happens to have a gambling addiction and flexible morals. "So you tell me: $50,000 for my kid (minus house payments) if I die of the brain tumor that's destroying me by the second. Or $546,000 for my kid, plus a steady income for the rest of his life, if I die from being a cop. What would you do? I think I know."

Readers spend the remainder of the book bizarrely cheering on Lloyd as he attempts to orchestrate his death in the line of duty. I say bizarrely because Lloyd is an endearing main character, one who is soft and kind, who is a world-class dad and who, in any other circumstance, you'd be hoping would somehow beat his glioblastoma. But the reality of his situation is that just as he makes peace with his impending death, so does the reader, and just like Lloyd, you hope for the best possible outcome for Bishop. "The Ten Gentle Edicts of Lloyd McNeil" interludes range from humorous to heart-wrenching, and author Will Leitch admits in the acknowledgements that they were the most difficult parts of the book to write "because they required me to think about what I would want my two sons to know most after I'm gone."

And that—fathers and sons—is what Lloyd McNeil's Last Ride is ultimately about. Between Lloyd's desire to financially take care of Bishop while leaving behind as much of his paternal guidance as possible, juxtaposed with the abrasive relationship between Lloyd and his own father, the book manages to look at a wide spectrum of what it means to be a dad. It's challenging to read in parts, but Leitch also injects plenty of humor to balance the pathos. It's a bit sappy, but not overly so given the emotional subject matter, and Leitch strikes a solid balance between the emotional weight of Lloyd dealing with his death and the absurdity of this mild-mannered man suddenly transforming into something resembling an action hero at times.

As I was approaching the concluding chapters, I thought Leitch had set up the perfect way for the book to end. It didn't follow the script in my head, and that zig when I wanted it to zag left me a little disappointed, even if my ending might have suffered from an abundance of coincidence. I don't know if it's better or worse for it, but that shift had me waffling between 4 and 5 stars. It's a book I'd recommend, especially for the rarity in the world of reading: male readers! This would make a great gift for your favorite dad, especially if you want to catch him getting a little weepy-eyed when he thinks you're not looking. It's an enjoyable blend of heart and humor that I think most will enjoy.