Customer Reviews

The Emperor of Ocean Park

5 star:		(109)
4 star:		(98)
3 star:		(73)
2 star:		(60)
1 star:		(64)

 

 

Although black influence may be discerned in many strands of modern popular culture, from sports to stand-up comedy, from music to fashion and movies, one couldn't say that this has also been the case for fiction. Professor Carter's book is a welcome first step in populating a compelling plot-driven narrative with characters we haven't heard from before (or at least, not to my knowledge). In "The Emperor of Ocean Park" black university graduates with high-powered jobs and all sorts of material comforts are resolutely center-stage. In Philip Roth's "The Human Stain", the main character must resign his blackness to achieve success and power in the academical world. Carter's characters never resign their race to be successful in the white man's world. The main voice is Talcott Garland's. He is a lawyer in his forties, a professor of law in an ivy-league-ish university, which in spite of Carter's denial in a post-scriptum is a straigth forward rendition of Yale Law School, where the author teaches. Garland is a complex man, not a cypher, surely a cut above the generic "cut-and-paste" renditions typical of modern popular fiction. He is slightly overweight, not very likeable (he is aloof and emotionally remote), very much his father's son. The father, the eponymous "Emperor of Ocean Park", is Oliver Garland, known in the book as "The Judge", a composite of Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, Judge Robert Bork and famous intellectual Thomas Sowell. A moderately conservative civil rights lawyer, he is appointed to a federal judgeship in the District of Columbia Appelate Court where he moves increasingly to the right. In the Reagan era he is nominated to the Supreme Court, but he must withdraw his candidacy when certain sordid associations become known to the public. He then joins a Washington D.C. firm as counsel and rakes in fat fees as a very popular public speaker. The Judge has shaped his children sometimes in ways he didn't mean to. The first born, Addison, is a rebel who refuses to be subject to his fathers very exacting standards of emotional self-control. His daughter, Mariah, the cleverest of all, has withdrawn from intellectual life to become wife of a rich white banker and mother of a large brood. Talcott has fled the rough and tumble of political life to become a tenured professor, and is stuck with Kimberley, a woman he adores, although she doesn't love him and may be cheating on him. A third daughter, Abby, died long ago, run over by a car that then fled the scene of the accident. This death is the catalyst of all that happens afterwards. The Judge is dead at the beginning of the book, and Talcott is quickly assailed by all sorts of shady figures who are looking for the Judge's arrangements. Talcott has no idea of what this means, and he struggles till the book's very end to find the arrangements and keep himself and his family alive. There is a complex chess problem (whose relevance is perhaps less clearly conveyed than the author intended) and several sub-plots to keep the reader occupied. Those thinking about buying the book should not be dissuaded by its heft. The book is a page turner and it has the right mixture of plot, action and rumination to keep the reader interested. It is also evidence that a book may be compelling without a single overtly sexual set-piece, without unnecessary profanity and without obsessive concern by fashionable slang or luxury good brands. This book will still be readable in fifty years without a special dictionary.

Many people have commented on the detailed rendition on the specifics of middle class lives. The big surprise is that these lives are similar to those of their white counterparts. Middle class blacks are hard working achievers, sometimes hindered by emotional distance and obsessive self-pondering. Perhaps one key point is that this is not the middle class as such that we are regarding, but the upper-middle class, with their large townhouses in Washington D.C. ("the Gold Coast") and their summer places in the Vineyard and the Hamptons.

We should expect this book to be slaughtered in the movie version, with Denzel Washington as Talcott, Morgan Freeman as the Judge, Hale Berry as Kimberley and Angela Basset as Maxine. Gene Hackman would be a good Justice Worthington. Read the book before you see the inevitable movie. It will only spoil the fun if you do otherwise.

Your Honor, the People will gladly stipulate that, if he will just move the story along, Professor Carter is uncommonly erudite and well-informed, culturally astute, and can hold forth on everything from Hindu deities to semiotics to classical music to minivans, as he proves in this book.

Every paragraph in his torturous and tortuous first novel is a rumination on or digression from the one before--physicists need look no further to discover the universe's longest distance between two points. In one spot, nearly three pages go by between the first and second rings of a phone. In another, one sentence is 25 lines long. The author must've made a deal with Knopf to be paid by the syllable (about three for a dollar if the reported amount of his advance is correct).

Story-wise, Carter has written a good 350-page yarn that takes him 650 pages to tell. A more apt title might've been Jerk Like Me since none of the characters is a bit likeable. As he takes three pages in an afterword to point out, they and the locations are fictional. It's a great relief to know that he himself is not the whiny, racist, snotty, law-professor second son of the title's deceased patriarch, who is still despotic despite being dead.

I have never written a novel--it seems so much easier to get one from Amazon. But if I did, I'm sure I would be infected with the same "first-novelitis" that befell Carter, the need to shoehorn into the tome every arcane bit of minutia, insightful observation and belabored turn of phrase I'd ever encountered in my life until then (I am the anti-Proust). If that's all out his system now, Carter's second novel could be a true masterpiece.

After reading Carter's earlier works -- The Culture of Disbelief, Integrity, and Civility -- I was curious to see what kind of novel he would write.

It was a joy to read about non-stereotypical black American characters, i.e. those who are are not drug lords and gangsters. I also enjoed following along as some of Carter's philosophies were woven into the plot.

The judge was a man tortured and I found the circumtances that led to his demise revealing. The book talks a lot about drawing lines and moving forward. Also revealed is the importance of not crossing some lines. Period.

Carter's protagonist was called to live a certain ideal and that ideal sometimes left the character seeming wimpy, but considered from the perspective of the calling that the Reverend Young explained beautifully, Tal's inability to really handle things made a lot of sense.

On the subject of Tal, I appreciated that he was human and not a superman, and thus, situations sometimes got away from him.

Carter handled some of the subleties of race well, as well as the impact on race relations by relativism. Tal was not to blame for everything that happened, but that didn't matter to his colleagues, who really, pretty much were interested in protecting their own. Carter's point here, I believe, was that the Good Ole Boys' club still exists, and if you're not in it, you'll find yourself flailing on the outside with no protection or hope.

I loved the length of the book, as the meatier a book, the better as far as I am considered. Those who prefer 200 pagers would probably want to look in a different section of the store. This book is for readers and thinkers.

"The Emperor of Ocean Park" is slightly longer than the phone book but not nearly as compelling. In the manner of bores, throughout the ages, Mr. Carter drones on and on with no concern about whether his audience is engaged or even awake.

The language is awkward and stiff. Almost 700 pages and not one believable 3 dimensional character. Characters described as brilliant behave in an incredibly dense fashion, others described as evil, turn out to be just kinda' unpleasant. And every couple of pages Mr. Carter brings everything to a grinding halt to give us a lecture on traditional family values.

The purported hero, a pudgy, charm less, sanctimonious slug is entirely unlikable. I think this was supposed to be a suspense novel but there is no tension. Most of the plot lines, such as they are, are tied up about 3/4 through, but Mr. Carter can't bring himself to end his opus. Worst of all, after slogging all the way to the end of this very long mess, the reader finds that the central mystery is never revealed. A real waste of time.

This book has gotten a lot of good press- good reviews and the distinction of being The Today Show's first book club selection. Not a bad introduction to the market. The reality, in this case, doesn't live up to the hype.
Carter's style might be better suited to writing non-fiction than fiction. The book bills itself as a thriller, yet lacks the pace needed to sustain a good thriller. Of course, there's more to this book than the solving of a mystery, for the questions to be answered are woven into an examination of the deceased Judge Oliver Garland's character, politics, and familial role as well as an exploration of love, fidelity, loyalty - all issues of life beyond the solving of a mystery. Maybe that's the problem - Carter bites off so much, that it takes him over 650 pages to digest it all, and ultimately leaves the reader with the feeling of indigestion one gets from overindulging at a buffet rather than with the satiety of having enjoyed a fine meal. There's enough material for two novels - one a mystery, one a character (or issue) analysis. Each character has his own agenda: Older son Addison is the most detached from the family crisis, although he actually knows more than his siblings. Mariah, mother of 5 (to become 6 in the course of the book) has such comforts in her affluent life that she is left with no reponsibilities, a condition which unleashes her active imagination in seeking the answer to the family mystery. Younger son Talcott narrates. He is a complex character with personal issues that sometimes hinder his search. Are we following his relationship with his deceased father, who he refers to formally as "The Judge," or is it his splintering relationship with wife Kimmer, a candidate for a Court of Appeals judgeship? Talcott, Tal, Misha, all the same person, has definite issues with race, despite his black middle class upbringing and his position as professor of law at a New England college. Talcott's issues with his straying and ambitious wife Kimmer are woven into his quest to solve the mystery of "the arrangements" his father left to be found after his death. Kimmer, consumed with her upward move, is resentful that Talcott's search will jeopardize her candidacy and distances herself from him emotionally. Talcott, on the other hand, recognizing the weakness of their relationship, would be willing to continue it since to him, "love is a behavior, not an emotion." These sound like the words of one who can think, but can't emote. Only with his young son is Talcott capable of emotional love.
There is more character development in this novel than in the typical thriller, yet none of the characters are particularly likeable. Addison is too absent, Mariah too pathetic, Tal too much of an intellectual snob. The least likeable one, though, is the deceased Judge Oliver Garland, who set the whole plot in motion, controlling his children's lives even from the grave. 650 pages after the search for "the arrangements" began, I was just happy to have reached the end.

This is not the genre I ordinarily go for, however, given my familiarity with the author's non-fiction works and reputation, I found myself intrigued.

Once I started I literally could not put the book down until I finished. Mr. Carter throws so many wrinkles, so many curves and also, I think, so many clues that I couldn't put the book down until I knew the conclusive answers.

Not only did I find the book entertaining and rather quick to read....I found the writing style, the use of language, the description and development of characters absolutely incredible.

In addition to a compelling story line, Mr. Carter provides provocative social commentary as well as an interesting sketch on the complexity of humanity.....The main character was extremely real to me and particularly fragile...(though often I wanted to smack him for his paranoia, but then,could you really blame him?)

I highly recommend this book. Its excellent.

This is one of the most tedious books I have read in the last 10 years! With a BA in English, I was assigned some slow moving novels, but at least I HAD to read those. Do yourself a favor & pass on this one. No one has this much extra time on his hands to make this a worth while read. The characters are so self-absorbed & unsympathetic that I just couldn't wait for the whole ordeal to end.

(1) Too many secondary characters receive too much attention

(2) A crucial character who is set-up to be intriguing turns out to have no impact on the plot at all

(3) A big secret you were waiting for...is never revealed

(4) Most of the characters are extremely self-absorbed

(5) For a book that supposedly relates the experiences an unfamiliar world. I found very little that could be called insightful or even fresh.

(6)There's a couple of nice passages that made me say "right on!" But not enough.

(7) Sub-plots introduced early in the book have very abrupt endings midway through...muting their impact or cause you to wonder why it wasn't edited out.

(8) At close to 700 pages the pacing was very inconsistent: at times I coudn't put it down, but more often I felt anchored in one spot for 50 to 100 pages at a time.

(9) The tone was unremittingly downbeat.

Stephen L. Carter has written some significant books. His academic qualifications are unquestioned. Unfortunately, his ability to write mystery stories or serious novels is in serious question. This book could easily be 200 pages and 10,000 adjectives shorter. Talcott, the hero of the story, and the son of the Emperor of Ocean Park is as unsympathetic a protagonist as you could ever want. I didn't care for this book at all. And I definitely won't be reading Mr. Carter's next novel.

What concerns me the most about this book is the incredible buzz surrounding its release. I cannot imagine how reputable critics were willing to give this novel a favorable review. It is a ponderous and clumsy effort at writing fiction by a man who should either stick to writing non-fiction or who should practice more before he publishes another novel. If you want a good read give this one a miss.

There is a lot to say, sociologically in every way about this book. I went into THE EMPEROR OF OCEAN PARK with a bad attiude: from various critics I had read (who I have a huge amount of respect for) it sounded dire. But then, critics are never a good reason to not pick it up at all.

If you glance through the various recent reviews (at the time of writing) on this website too, you will not find any particularly high appraisals either. Let's try and work out what is going on here, then, because the author was paid $4.2 million for this grand oeuvre, and publishers are usually fairly frugal with their bugets for first novels.

For a start, this is not, in the traditional sense, a first novel. Stephen L. Carter has written numerous works of non-fiction before, which are incredibly and often moving excercises of historical and political theory. So it's not as if he has NEVER picked up a pen before and attempted in one swift blow a six-hundred page debut! In writing non-fiction, you only have to imagine how many times Mr. Carter must have sketched out a random prose of fiction about the state or history he was researching ... it's a natural human inclination.

This book was pegged as a thriller, and a kind of socio-analysis of American society a the same time. This, I think, is where the reaction lies. If you've seen EYES WIDE SHUT (Kubric's last work) you'll understand why people were so disappointed on seeing it: they expected their commercial, loveable Tom Cruise to be the commercial, loveable Tom he always is and that they are so familiar with. People did not want to see a genuine piece of art with agenuinly brilliant actor: they wanted to unwind. In THE EMPEROR OF OCEAN PARK, the scenario was very similar: the public thought they had a new Grisham, and found to their horror that they were left here with a new voice. And not only that, this voice had a gutteral hallmark to it.

The EOP is a great, far-reaching piece of work. Inside every description, in every telephone call and mild familial banter, is a subliminal critique on society. The plot is a mechanism for super-analysis, somethng very few authors still manage to pull off. Read this book, and while doing so, look for hints ... there are many of them.

This book was, to me, the extant anti-thriller: a place where all society like sheep came to congregate to find that their hero was a member of mensa instead of an actor off a Hollywood side-show. Well worth its money, and well worth its time.