Seven Ways...
for a Great Read about So Cal
I’ll be honest. I’m a bibliophile. I’m also old-school. I don’t do E-readers. I like the tactile sensation of flipping musty pages of a well worn paperback; however, in whatever medium you are taking your dose of Vitamin B(ook), it’s the act itself that matters most. Here are seven ways to add to your word count while reading about our local environs.
Ramona by Helen Hunt Jackson - This novel set in the post Mexican-American War comes to pass throughout Southern California. It explores themes of race, colonial California, and perhaps influenced the Mission Revival Style architecture that gained prominence in the area, and can still be seen today.
The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler - The quintessential hard-boiled detective novel that takes place throughout Southern California. More atmospheric than plot driven, this book typifies the genre. The title is a euphemism for “death”, but the Big Sleep could just as easily refer to the post 2008 real estate crash…zing!
Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon - This darkly comedic detective novel hallucinates in the 1970’s amid a place that may or may not be the El Porto part of Manhattan Beach (not North Manhattan). This freakish romp through a drug hazed and counter cultured Southern California is probably Pynchon’s most accessible work, although the prices in El Porto…not so much.
Ham on Rye by Charles Bukowski - This coming of age novel set in Depression-era Los Angeles. Henry Chinaski is the world’s coolest misanthrope looking for some meaning and inclusion, while getting into a few beers and scraps on the way. He’s now got some permanent real estate in Green Hills. “Don’t try.”
Death is a Lonely Business by Ray Bradbury - This novel set in Venice is about a series of strange and eerie murders that somehow coincide with the main characters clacking typewriter. This novel written in 1985, elicits a declining seaside village. Now in 2018, Venice real estate is far from that. Please don’t call it Silicon Beach. That’s just silly.
The Tribes of Palos Verdes by Joy Nicholson - A coming of age novel for the beach-going set. Sex, drugs and Haggerty’s. It’s all about the South Bay. Now a film, but who watches movies anymore?
Small Talk on Virginia Street by Coulter Jacobs - Author, artist, and former resident of El Segundo and said eponymous street, Jacob’s oeuvre creates homage as well as angst to his roots in these tightly packed poems.