TV news anchor Jim Lehrer sharply detours from the comic road many of his previous novels ran along, in "White Widow." He does continue his love affair with buses, but this time the bus eventually results in the disintegration of a basically good, simple man.
Jack T. Oliver leads a quiet, limited life. He has spent many of his 36 years piloting a Great Western Trailways bus from Houston to Corpus Christi, Texas, and back again. When he is not driving, Jack hangs about his little house, eating meatloaf, which he loves, and discussing and rediscussing with his wife how they will decorate their home for the Christmas holidays. He is a happy man, but he has one flaw."He was a thinker even if he wasn't a man of great ideas and heavy thoughts, even if he was stupid, even if he was a bus driver. He used his mind to go places and do things. His mother said he should be careful with all of that imagining because it could lead him to real trouble someday."
It does. The day the "White Widow" boards Jack's bus, he is a lost man. Among bus drivers the term "meant any mysterious, beautiful, perfect woman passenger who probably was not available. A black widow only better."
Jack immediately falls in love with his mysterious and beautiful passenger. And, as she rides his bus rather often, his love becomes an obsession over which Jack has no control. In his near-crazed imagination they become lovers. Unfortunately for him, the woman he adores barely knows he's alive.
Jack's comfortable life begins to crumble. He estranges his wife first and by the time the matter is played out three innocent people are dead.
Lehrer spins his story of monomaniacal lust well.