Bucephalus was the warhorse of Alexander the Great, tamed by Alexander as a boy after no one else could ride him, and carried into virtually every major battle of Alexander’s campaigns until the horse’s death in 326 BC, after which Alexander founded a city in his honor. Invoking the name for a laundered, stolen Mercedes is the kind of grandiose, faux-classical flourish Zhorik reaches for throughout the novel — elevating a shady used car into a legendary steed with nothing more than a straight face and a well-timed kick of the tires.