6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Looking For Clues And Lost Shakers Of Salt, September 9, 2005
Sometimes a book takes a sudden twist that knocks you for a loop. Other times, you find yourself reading a book where you have a pretty good idea what the twist is going to be, only you keep reading because you care so much about the central character you hope you're wrong. The second kind is more impressive to me, and "The Golden Orange" is a perfect example of it.
Joseph Wambaugh's 1990 novel focuses on a boozy ex-cop's love affair with a beautiful society girl on the coast of Newport Beach in Orange County, California. Maybe that's why people are down on it; it's more Raymond Chandler than Ed McBain. Yet I can't help loving "The Golden Orange," one of the most humorous and emotionally compelling novels I have ever read.
There isn't anything here to surprise film noir enthusiasts, though this is much different in tone and story. With his masterly sense of characterization, Wambaugh starts off putting the reader in the shoes of Winnie Farlowe, a hard-drinking 40-year-old forced off the local police because of injury. Adrift, wishing he could return to a job where he mattered, he wastes his small pension drowning his sorrows in one of the few cheap dives in Orange County, occasionally getting a peek at the well-heeled around him.
Winnie's a hard guy not to like, with his sardonic yet humble manner. Told he is ingenuous, Winnie asks: "Is that like ingenious? I used to be ingenious sometimes. Working on homicide gave me ingenious moments." He's so straight up he pays child support for his ex-wife's kids because he adopted them during the marriage. The only thing he's not straight up about is his drinking: "I'm not an alcoholic. I jist shouldn't drink rum!"
After a mad drunken boat ride lands Winnie in the papers for a couple of days, into his bar walks an unexpected grace note. Tess Binder, a 43-year-old thrice-divorced "Hot Momma," saw his picture in the paper and felt something, it's hard to explain what exactly, that made her want to reach out to Winnie.
In no time they're in bed, she's asking him to stay the week, calling him "old son," seeking his help in figuring out what happened to her father's lost fortune and why someone might be trying to kill her. Protective Winnie is convinced his life just passed perfect and is somewhere north of sensational. Except when he dreams.
Wambaugh finds a cagey balance between amusement and gravity with the alcoholic Winnie. When we first meet him is having one of his three-in-the-morning wake-up calls with his version of pink elephants, two buzzards he visualizes pecking at his stomach. He's so used to them he's given them names.
There's also a nice portrait of Newport Beach, Wambaugh's home turf when he wrote "The Golden Orange." After a small temblor gets his customer praying, a bartender wisecracks: "A day to go down in Newport Beach history...Fifteen square miles a greed and white-collar crime. And people finally pray because of a little four-point-sixer." Among the funny asides is a dissertation on the different kinds of rich, and how the Hot Mommas work their tans and plastic surgeons in a never-ending quest to marry up.
The one downside of the book is a tinness of dialogue: The bar Winnie frequents is full of drunks who seem to one-up each other with wisecracks straight from Neil Simon. But this wouldn't be as much of a flaw in a lesser book. There are moments, mostly between Winnie and Tess, where the conversations ache with real emotion, and you can almost hear the lilt of laughter in Tess's voice.
Other people express their frustration with Wambaugh after his 70s/80s commercial peak, but "The Golden Orange" makes me want to read more. I love his humor here, but I treasure his sensitivity and his compassion for the unlucky and dumped-upon even more. It's a keeper.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Brilliant and addictively readable, September 19, 2008
As one who has read about six of Wambaugh's books, I don't understand those who gave weak reviews to this book. In fact if I'd never read
any of his other work, I'd still feel strongly that this one stands on its own. It 'is what it is' as they say and I found it hard to put-down (a rare circumstance for me, when reading fiction) after discovering this book at a church rummage sale, in September, 2008.
As a retired policeman myself (25 years Detroit PD) and a published author (7 titles-check Mark A. Bando on Amazon.com), I suspect that I may be somewhat biased toward stories dealing with retired police officers. However, I believe that any male reader who is dealing with middle age, retirement and looming senior citizenship, could relate to the mysteries of life that Mr. Wambaugh forces us to examine and ponder as this tale unfolds.
He has skillfuly woven the plot and well-developed characters together to make this book a masterpiece in my estimation. It is possible that cops more than the average guy, ponder questions of human behavior and life more relentlessly than the average non-police person. The never- ending quest to discover life's 'meaning' (what's it all about?) and the motivations behind cruel/damaging human behavior are the mysteries examined, but never answered in this book. I like this about the book as well, because these questions are daily puzzled-over by millions, yet seldom discussed or illuminated in any public venue.
Indeed Wambaugh realizes that we can never know the answers, but instead we are left to ponder with jaw-dropping amazement, how deeply personal betrayal can be justified by some individuals, in the greedy quest for materialistic gain.
Wambaugh has written about 'monsters' in his other books, killers capable of physical violence-even murder. But the monster in this book is Tess Binder, whose cold-blooded betrayal of the hapless protagonist is every bit as brutal as the actions of a serial killer. She is a psychic serial killer and a reminder that what you see on the surface is not always indicative of what lurks inside. Also, that any dame who has been divorced three times might just be the 'cause', rather than the victim of those failed unions. We often hear of two or three-time losers who are just victims of 'bad choices' or bad luck-not the case here. Maybe Tess's previous husbands WERE jerks but perhaps she deserved what she got. This book also reminds us that if it looks too good to be true, it almost certainly IS.
So, after the final tragedy unfolds in this book, we are no more capable of 'understanding' Tess Binder's brain or soul. We are just left to ponder how a beautiful, rich feline can live with her own conscience after exploiting and damaging someone so shamelessly in pursuit of money-There's another thing to ponder: why the rich are so relentlessly greedy to become even MORE rich?
All these questions run through Wambaugh's story, without being delineated in so many words. Just maybe the mental capacity to hurt people in quest of wealth explains how the rich acquired their wealth in the first place?
Surely these questions play on the author's mind and he has put the scenarios out there for the rest of us to ponder and mull-over.
Perhaps the soaring hope that Winnie felt when a girl who 'has it all' seemed to show genuine interest in a poor, retired pensioner for what he IS, rather than what he HAS, is another feeling that many of us can relate to, as well as the author. The only emergency parachute Winnie has, is that he has been around long-enough to somewhat dis-believe his good fortune from the beginning of the affair.
He questions how long it will last, before she gets tired of him and dumps him. The author has made the characters so real that one believes Tess actually developed some genuine feelings for her victim, before dropping the bomb on him.
The interaction between them while it does last is so seemingly genuine and compelling that the reader is also let-down cruelly when Tess dashes his hopes, ego, trust and love when her true character and motives are revealed at the end of the book. Wambaugh doesn't have to explain to us how devastating this experience is to the mind of his protagonist-we KNOW without having it spelled-out.
Although a serious alcoholic, Winnie is admirable in many ways, a 'straight ahead guy', who, because of his idealism and integrity is a perfect fall guy for Tess' evil intentions.
Perhaps this is another theme of the author's...that the world is not a friendly place for straight ahead guys?
I think it was Bumper Morgan, a cop in one of Wambaugh's earlier novels, who stated that any time he got really close to somebody, that relationship was severed with a 'bloody sword'. This truth resonates with Wambaugh and here he has graphically illuminated a ghastly example of such a scenario. The reader also wonders how much of Wambaugh's various cop characters are reflections of himself.
Tess' type of monster, a beautiful feline with money and a ruthless, aquisitive mind-set, enjoys a dangerous degree of power while still young and attractive. She is not only a monster but also a cruelty joke of nature, making one ponder why God would put such an ugly personna in such a beautiful package. But perhaps this is merely 'survival of the fittest', the evolved product of those who have risen to the top precisely because they have teamed ruthlessness with the ability to attract 'fish'(victims), using the bait of physical attractiveness?
What I finally ponder after reading this, is that nursing homes must be filled with over the hill monsters like Tess. Because in the final analysis, all is bio-degradable and even the mega-rich must eventually die. I have to wonder how the Egos of these once so-powerful ladies cope, when they are no longer desirable, nor attractive?
Observing such creatures at the height of their power, one has to doubt that they have any inkling that they might someday no longer be invincible. How do they feel when they are passing the final boring years or decades, unwanted, undesirable, and wasting away?
Even if their wealth allows them to live-out their final years at home, they must deal with the loss of beauty/desirability that aging brings.
Perhaps this is the hellish retribution they must face?
And how well do they cope with memories of how they used, exploited and hurt people with such callous disregard back in their heyday?
As to guilt, perhaps they feel nothing. The conscience-less individual
probably has no regrets and merely feels that she did what she had to do.
In this case, one feels that just maybe Tess DID have some genuine feelings for Winnie, which might someday come back to bite her.
While neither Joseph Wambaugh nor any other mortal human author knows all the answers to these deeper questions, he has done us a service by illuminating yet another kind of criminal...a killer of interpersonal trust and decency...a callous, sociopathic thief of the human spirit. Saddest of all, this crime of betrayal was done in the quest for material gain.
Thanks so much Mr. Wambaugh, for crafting this entertaining and thoughtful piece of work. I do think it is one of your best.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
