This book by a L.A. novelist has been announced as the 2021 winner of a Goodreads online poll in the category of historical fiction, although both the history connection, and how the polling was conducted is obscure to me. This may be the result of nothing more than a triumph of self-promotion by the author and/or aggressive marketing by the publisher.
The Riva family is the focus with Mick Riva possibly being loosely modelled after Mick Jagger. The four Riva children all seem to be obsessed with superficial appearances, wealth, sex, and fame. All of their friends and acquaintances- young aspiring actors, producers, surfers and other athletes, musicians, screen-writers and assorted pop culture celebrities- seem to make all major life decisions with their gonads rather than their brains.
The depiction of the superficiality, sex-obsession and self-absorption of Hollywood denizens seems straight out of People Magazine or some trashy paparazzi tabloid, but even those outlets can’t match the exaggerated sensationalism and pathos here. The focus in Part II is on the huge annual Nina Revi party, fuelled by prodigious amounts of alcohol, pot, LSD, and cocaine, leading to sexual excesses, while many longstanding conflicts come to a head at the all-night debauchery. The plot does get more complicated than the endless indiscriminate copulation that makes up much of the first part. The ending is unpredictable, ingeniously imaginative and appropriate.
There are descriptions of graphic sexual exploits, and abundant coarse language. The best narrative in the book, in my estimation, is the pathos of four young children adjusting to the life-threatening problems created by their single mother’s descent into terminal alcoholism.
I listened to the CloudLibrary audiobook edition. This has two advantages for absorbing such a book. First, the extensive dialogue, narrated superbly by Julie Whalen, is much more expressive with volume and intonation variations that cannot be captured in print. Secondly, it does not preclude multitasking such as snacking or watching the TV news while at least half listening to the story. And my wife insists that my multitasking in this instance included a couple of short naps while ‘listening’ to this book. At least not a complete waste of 11 hours and six minutes. To the author’s credit, there is just enough suspense that I listened to the end, though tempted to abandon it earlier, just to find out what happens when the police arrive at the party. But if this novel is ever made into a movie, as is rumoured, they would need to hire a large cast of porn stars to make it realistic.
Some voyeuristic readers may enjoy this book but I did not.
The Passionate Reader 