This amusing opening scene turns out to be the high point in a novel that never evolves beyond its intriguing premise. The problem is certainly not Lulu: she is a cracking character, her complex mixture of youthful arrogance and philosophical self-doubt the anti-thesis of Marylou and all the other pretty, cardboard-chicks Kerouac half-sketched while On the Road (1957). Ironically, the internal voyages of self-discovery which the Beats specialised in would have drawn out Lulu's character nicely here, but instead she gets caught up in plot contrivances, her introspection drowned out by a bank heist, a first romance, and a car chase. Worse, especially for a story about travel, the descriptions of Mexico range from lazy to borderline offensive, reducing the entire country to a clichéd desert of criminals, corruption, and black beans. Such inauthenticity of plot and place is dangerous when working under the self-imposed shadow of Kerouac, a writer who, despite his many flaws, lived a life dedicated to truth.