Angelic Darkness [Paperback]

Richard Zimler (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 2000

A divorced man living in San Francisco is guided by his roommate deep within the Tenderloin neighborhood of prostitutes and transvestites, down a perilous sexual and spiritual path.

--This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Androgyny and the occult offer solutions to a painful spiritual crisis in this mystical account of a divorced man's struggle for personal transformation in 1980s San Francisco. After his chronic philandering breaks up his marriage, psychically fragile Bill Ticino is afraid of the dark and cannot sleep, alone in his suddenly empty home. His job as the editor of a corporate magazine is unfulfilling, and offers him no refuge. To remedy the situation he takes in a housemate, the mysterious, handsome androgynous Peter who brings his pet hoopoe bird, Maria. Bill is immediately fascinated by Peter, drawn to him not only by his looks, but by his odd, poetic way of speaking, his acute sense of smell, his strange stories about mythical creatures and human atrocities, his seeming ability to read Bill's thoughts, the bizarre talismans and Holocaust relics he collects, and the unmistakable impression that he is not quite what he seems. Peter introduces Bill to some other unusual characters from his world, encourages him to interview prostitutes in San Francisco's Tenderloin district, and gradually reveals moreAthough never allAof his secrets. Bill's exploration of his own androgyny becomes the key to his recovery and transformation. Zimler (The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon) relies little on present action in the novel, often preferring to have characters sit and tell stories to one another. But the candid first-person narrative generates suspense, as well as a deep concern for what will happen to narrator Bill. The brooding atmosphere and carefully if funereally paced plot promise a strong denouement, but this one is surprisingly perfunctory. Zimler is skilled at evoking an eerie San Francisco underworld, but his need to imbue nearly every moment with undefinable, kabbalistic significance ultimately wears thin. (Sept.)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Library Journal

Set in 1980s San Francisco, Zimler's (The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon) new novel tells the story of Bill Ticino, who has opted to take a roomie, his marriage having truly soured. And then the going gets weird, as the new roomie, PeterAhandsome, charming, and androgynous, with an exotic pet and more exotic habits and storiesAentices Bill into all sorts of directions, including the raw world of runaways, prostitutes, and transvestites in the Tenderloin district. The book runs a lot on episode, some of them grim (one featuring a bead-chain made partly of human teeth extracted from a military torturer by his victim), some of them humorous, and some both; but the ones from the Tenderloin tend toward the harrowing. Eventually, things even out, Bill tries an unsuccessful reunion with his wife, finds out that he's gay (well, this is San Francisco), finds Paul (Peter and Paul?), and falls in love. Interesting, quirky fiction for curious readers susceptible to the curious.
-ARobert E. Brown, Onondaga Cty. P.L., Syracuse, NY
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 247 pages
• Publisher: Arcadia Books (January 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1900850303
• ISBN-13: 978-1900850308
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.9 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,128,436 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Richard Zimler was born in Roslyn Heights, a suburb of New York, in 1956. After earning a bachelor's degree in comparative religion from Duke University (1977) and a master's degree in journalism from Stanford University (1982), he worked for eight years as a journalist, mainly in the San Francisco Bay area. In 1990, he moved to Porto, Portugal, where he taught journalism for sixteen years, first at the College of Journalism and later at the University of Porto. Richard has published eight novels over the last 15 years. In chronological order, they are: The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon, Unholy Ghosts, The Angelic Darkness, Hunting Midnight, Guardian of the Dawn, The Search for Sana, The Seventh Gate and The Warsaw Anagrams. His novels have appeared on bestseller lists in 12 different countries, including the USA, Great Britain, Portugal, Brazil, Italy, and Australia. Richard has won numerous prizes for his work, including the Prix Alberto Benveniste in 2009, for Guardian of the Dawn (for Jewish-themed fiction), and the 1998 Herodotus Award, for The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon (Best First Historical Novel). His latest novel, The Warsaw Anagrams, was chosen as 2010 Book of the Year in Portugal, by both the country's main literary monthly (LER) and high school teachers and students. Hunting Midnight, The Search for Sana and The Seventh Gate have all been nominated for the International IMPAC Literary Award, the richest prize in the English-speaking world. He was also granted a 1994 U.S. National Endowment of the Arts Fellowship in Fiction. The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon, Hunting Midnight, Guardian of the Dawn and The Seventh Gate form the "Sephardic Cycle," a group of inter-connected - but fully independent - novels about different branches and generations of a Portuguese Jewish family. in 2010, a short film he based on one of his short stories won the Best Drama award at the New York Downtown Short Film Festival. It is entitled The Slow Mirror. Richard also writes reviews for the L.A. Times. When he's not writing, he enjoys gardening at his weekend house in the north of Portugal.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Strange But Satisfying, April 11, 2001

By 

Frank Perry (Seattle, WA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Angelic Darkness: A Novel (Hardcover)

This is a strange story. It didn't seem like an American novel at all, perhaps because the author, Richard Zimler, lives in Portugal immersed in a foreign culture which seeps into his American-set story. The prose is rich and inviting, the story complex and mysterious.

The setting is San Francisco in the 1980's. The main character Bill has recently separated from his wife. Haunted by this split, by his growing distance from his younger brother Jay, his estrangement from his mother, and memories of his cruel father, Bill feels lost and alone. He decides that he cannot face living in his house alone and decides to take in a tenant. The potential tenants who answer his ad are dreary, dull, not suitable at all. Bill almost changes his mind when suddenly a striking man appears at his doorstep: Peter. Peter is urbane, intelligent, mysterious, intriguing. Bill doesn't quite know why he finds Peter so attractive, but, even fearing he's making a mistake as he does it, he agrees to take Peter as a tenant.

Their friendship grows slowly. Peter introduces Bill to several characters as strange as he is: Mara the singer who had a childhood illness that destroyed the developmental hormones she needs for normal growth. She looks fifteen but is approaching fifty. Then there's Rain, the young prostitute, and William, an otherworldly, menacing older figure that seems to be a threat not only to Bill but to Peter himself. The gloominess of some of this is somehow still beautiful and inviting. As the novel progresses Bill begins to doubt everything, ultimately wondering if Peter is even really a human being, or some combination good/evil "angel of darkness."

Surprisingly, this dark novel has a happy ending. There seemed to me to be a few loose ends never explained. But then real life has its loose ends whose truths are never revealed to us, so I accepted these minor omissions in the novel.

Deftly told, richly described, this is a very unique novel. If you enjoy strange stories, this may just be the book for you.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars painfully obvious, April 18, 2009

By 

jfpessoa "jfpessoa" - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Angelic Darkness: A Novel (Hardcover)

I found this novel nothing short of dreadful. Despite exotic trappings and labored arcane rigamarole, the characters are cardboard creations pushed through a plot that is totally transparent from square one. Even in his better efforts Zimler's style tends to cloy because of his evident belief that his work is deeply meaningful and must therefore be difficult to grasp, and as a result he constantly makes the obvious even more painfully so with authorial nudges in the ribs. He has hit rock bottom here.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Short visit to another planet, February 12, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: The Angelic Darkness: A Novel (Hardcover)

The characters of the Angelic Darkness caught my eye when I was actually looking for the Last Kabbalist of Lisbon, absent from my book store. I was looking for stories about Sephardic Jews and it was recommended to me. The Angelic Darkness had a continuous thread. I thought for awhile that the characters in Bill's book about the Inquisition would reappear as promised. The ending gave me the impression that Zimler stopped writing his book and started telling about his love affair. They were only scantily connected. At first, I thought this was a weird, spiritual, loose kind of book. Then, at the end, I thought it was just a weak story by a good writer who wasn't writing well at the time. Proves anyone can get a book published.