The Gangster of Love [Hardcover]

Jessica Hagedorn (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 27, 1996

Jessica Hagedorn's first novel, Dogeaters, was nominated for the National Book Award and hailed by Robert Stone as " the definitive novel of the encounter between the Philippines and America." Hagedorn's long-awaited second novel, The Gangster of Love, is equally compelling as she continues to illuminate flamboyantly that intersection where American pop culture and local Filipino tradition commingle. Alternating between the Philippines and the United States, The Gangster of Love is the story of Rocky Rivera, who plays in a dissolute rock band with her on-again, off-again boyfriend, Elvis Chang. Rocky's spirited and deeply traditional mother, Milagros, her troubled and bedeviled brother, Voltaire, her wonderfully eccentric uncle, Marlon, and her best friend, the wildly unpredictable and enigmatic Keiko, along with other characters real and imagined, create a story that spans generations and cultures. Together they acquire spouses, lovers, companions, children, and in-laws, making a plac

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Jessica Hagedorn received high praise for her debut novel, Dogeaters, which took place in Manila. Her second book shows that Dogeaters was no fluke. The Gangster of Love opens in Manila but the action quickly moves to San Francisco and then New York before turning full circle. Hagedorn's worlds are peopled with a maelstrom of jostling, exuberant characters. The focal point of this storm of humanity is Raquel (Rocky) Rivera. The arc of her journey from Manila to the United States and back will include a boyfriend named Elvis Chang (with whom she plays in a rock band called Gangsters of Love), a daughter, a flock of drag queens, and jobs as receptionist at an acupuncture clinic and waitress at a French-Vietnamese bistro. Original, exhilarating and electric, The Gangster of Love takes a fresh look at family and questions of race, culture and identity.

From Publishers Weekly

Hagedorn's long-awaited but ultimately disappointing second novel (her first, Dogeaters, was a finalist for the National Book Award) is the mostly first-person account of Rocky Rivera, who has emigrated from the Philippines to the United States along with her mother and her emotionally disturbed brother, Voltaire. Rocky has a hippyish adolescence in 1970s San Francisco, then moves to New York City with her boyfriend, Elvis Chang, and her best friend, a photographer named Keiko. Rocky and Elvis form a band, while Keiko enjoys huge (and rather improbable) success as an artist. While Hagedorn's first novel utilized multiple perspectives and collage techniques to great effect, here her occasional shifts in point of view seem motivated mainly by an inability to keep her somewhat meandering novel moving along. Offering little in the way of plot, the book's narcissistic characters and bohemian milieu soon begin to wear thin. Hagedorn does remain a sharp observer of cross-cultural identity as her Filipino characters adjust to life in the U.S.; the novel is at its best when dealing head-on with issues of assimilation. But on the whole, this feels like apprentice work in comparison to what Hagedorn achieved in her debut.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 311 pages
• Publisher: Houghton Mifflin; First Edition edition (August 27, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0395754127
• ISBN-13: 978-0395754122
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,615,876 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars a rocky novel -- what happened?, June 12, 2001

By 

JCB (I Love Seattle!) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The Gangster of Love (Paperback)

It's not surprising that people are left confused after reading Hagedorn's _The Gangster of Love_. In many ways, it embellishes the postcolonial nightmare of Filipinos, embodied in Rocky Riveras's family, that non-Filipinos may not understand. As a Filipino American, I must confess, there were parts of the novel that confused me as well. The read felt cumbersome at times, almost contrived, and cliche. Rocky Rivera's journey into the American landscape seemed too incredible for a first generation Filipino American to experience. The novel excels in destabilizing boundaries--ethnic, racial, gender, and sexual--and challenging convential narrative schema. If her unorthodox construction of chapters and narrative structure was meant to symbolize the dystopic, fragmented, or neocolonial mindset of Filipinos, I don't think Hagedorn was successful. I don't doubt Hagedorn's innovative talents as an artist and writer. Her novel _Dogeaters_, is brilliant. _The Gangster of Love_, unfortunately doesn't compare.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant Narrative but Unfocused, June 11, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Gangster of Love (Paperback)

This book hooks you immediately and rarely lulls. The female characters are fascinating, but the male characters seem 2-dimensional (although, this may not be unrealistic). The main character's best friend Keiko is one of the wildest, most interesting characters I've seen in print! It reads more like a poem, gritty and brilliant and chaotic, with the voice often changing from character to character, giving an even broader portrait of the dynamics at play. My only complaint was that the story seemed to wander, giving it an almost Kerouac-type feel, seeming more incidental than integral, more like a biography in poem than a novel. Overall, it was a great read which I devoured in two days, and I look forward to more of Ms Hagedorn's work.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Catherine's Book Review, October 25, 2002

By 

Catherine (Daly City, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Gangster of Love (Paperback)

The Gangster of Love is a book about a Filipino girl, Raquel or Rocky Rivera, who moves to San Francisco from Manila, Philippines. She moves to San Francisco with her brother who had unusual depression moods and her wild mother, leaving behind her father and her older sister in Manila. Rocky's mother and father had an unusual on and off relationship that caused Rocky's mother, Milagros, to leave her father and oldest daughter. Her mother is a wild person who enjoys cooking lumpias and she starts her own store to make a living called "Lumpia X Press." Rocky's brother becomes depressed on and off and he sometimes has temper tantrums in the middle of the night. One of the things he really wants to do is spend time with Rocky.

Rocky is a young woman who enjoys writing poetry and songs. She meets her boyfriend, Elvis, who is starting a band. Rocky and Elvis are introduced together by her brother and they become very close in their relationship. Rocky is in a point in her life where she wants to "find herself." By finding herself, Rocky sets out on a road trip with her boyfriend, and two other band mates, to New York to find a record deal there. She is overcome with some obstacles like leaving her mother to move to New York, not spending time with her brother, making decisions about life, sex, and drugs.

I enjoyed this book because it had some humorous parts. The author didn't want their readers to be bored so she included some jokes to lighten up the story. Most of the book was humorous to me because many of her jokes were Filipino-related and I could relate to them. I don't think people who don't understand the Filipino culture very well will understand many of the jokes, but others non-Filipinos will find some of her jokes amusing.

I would recommend this book to those who are interested in reading about an immigrant coming to the United States from a foreign country, and witnessing the struggles of a young person who is traveling over the country to find what she is and who she wants to be. I would especially recommend this book to Filipino Americans who are interested about their culture and family life in the United States because when I was reading this book, I could relate to a lot of things that Rocky was talking about. I don't recommend this book to those who like books that go by really quickly because this is a book that takes a long time; it goes by pretty slow. Otherwise, I'd recommend this book to others who want to read about a woman struggling toward her decisions in life.