T Jefferson Parker California Girl
A review of T Jefferson Parker's novel California Girl
Four brothers grow up together in the orange groves of Orange County California. One heads to war, never to return; one becomes a minister, turning away from his longings; one a reporter, forced to use his volatile brothers as fodder for news; and one a cop, haunted by a California girl who once taunted he and his brothers after a fight that shaped their lives.
One sweltering summer twilight long before suburbia started to eat the orange groves, Nick, Clay, Andy and David Becker were walking to a rumble to back up the taunts Clay had thrown at the Vonns, local hooligans. They goaded each other along the walk, trying to psych each other up for what was sure to be a mismatched fight. In spite of dirty fighting by the Vonns, they won, but it was a bittersweet victory - their father loaded them into the family wagon and marched to the Vonns to apologize. It was while there that they saw Janelle Vonn, the orange thrower and the Vonn's littlest sister, half hiding with one black eye. They all knew without knowing that their fight had somehow trickled down to poor Janelle.
The years go by and the boys grow older. David starts the first drive-in ministry in California, finding unprecendeted success. The Vonn's lives continue to cross with the Beckers, Andy writing the obituary for the suicide of their mother and then later, the story of the continual brutalizing of Janelle by her brothers. Nick, the cop, finds himslf handling their arrest and becoming a sudden hero - a stepping stone on his way to Homicide Detective and later FBI Specialist. Clay continues to immerse himself in CIA subculture, eventually heading off to war as an undercover operative, never to return.
As the decades roll by, each of the three remaining boys finds success in thier own way, even as their parents decline in their anger and sadness over losing Clay, eventually disconnecting with reality. Then one day a girl is found murdered in the old Sunshine Orange packing plant - Janelle Vonn. So begins a turn in their lives that changes them all as the brothers' involvement with the Vonn family, and with Janelle, affects the case.
Years later Nick and Andy meet at a diner, where Andy drops the bombshell that Nick had arrested and helped convict the wrong man for Janelle brutal murder and rape. We follow Nick from present day back into his memories as he reopens the decades old murder case and solves it once and for all, in spite of the risk to his family and career.
Parker delivers a sweeping, gorgeous portrait of two families in California, murder, abuse, homosexuality, religion, first love, war, political scheming and integrity. I couldn't put this book down from page one, reading it in one sitting - something I don't usually do with this genre.
Tags: t jefferson parker california girl
book cover image supplied by bamm
|
More in Reading & Literature
Latest Articles