All aboard Jim Lehrer's new novel, "Super"

Jim Lehrer
Longtime journalist Jim Lehrer is the news anchor for PBS Newshour on PBS. Lehrer is a bus enthusiast, and is a supporter of the Pacific Bus Museum in Williams, California and the Museum of Bus Transportation in Hershey, Pennsylvania.
MPR Photo/Sam Choo

They called it the train of the stars. The Super Chief was a streamlined flagship of the Santa Fe railroad. It ran from Chicago to Los Angeles, and pampered its often famous passengers in luxury and discretion.

One trip in 1956 finds former President Harry Truman and movie star Clark Gable on the same train with a washed-up Hollywood producer, a mysteriously ill, former government agent, and a frequent passenger who dies in his berth.

That's the basic scenario in Jim Lehrer's new novel "Super," his 20th book. The anchor and executive editor of the PBS NewsHour joined Tom Crann on All Things Considered.

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