help of a family friend—Roger Stoltz, an adviser to Richard Nixon—David buys the decaying business and turns it into the area’s first drive-in church. While his brother Nick moves ahead in the sheriff’s department and Andy uses journalism to validate his intelligence, another brother—Clay—goes to Vietnam as an adviser. Their father joins the John Birch Society, believing that communism is a real threat to American freedom.
The murder of Janelle Vonn is the backbone of Parker’s novel: it changes the lives of every other character. But the dead girl is more than the center of a first-rate mystery. She had enjoyed some fame:
“Got her picture taken a lot. Tustin people thought she looked like the old SunBlesst girl, so they did up a poster of her with oranges, an old-fashioned kind of picture that made her look really pretty and made it seem like Tustin still had orange groves…”
CITIZEN VINCE, by Jess Walter (Regan/HarperCollins)
I can see the headlines now: “LOCAL DONUT MAN’S LIFE CHANGED BY VOTING.” The fact that the man in question is Vince Camden, a 36-year-old credit card scammer, expert poker player, small-time drug dealer and indeed a maker of excellent maple bars, and that his voting choice is between Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter in 1980, gives Jess Walter’s combination of immensely entertaining crime thriller and wry social commentary a decidedly different series of twists, and mark it as a sure candidate for one of the best books in recent genre memory.
Camden, not the name he was born with in New York City, now lives as a protected government witness in Spokane, Washington—a town (Walter’s home) described with a totally understandable mixture of love and contempt. A smart and touching hooker named Beth, studying for her real estate license, shares his affections with Kelly, a sleek blonde who wants him to work for the election of her lawyer boss, a rising Republican. In the three years since he accepted a Federal offer and blew the whistle on same made guys in New York, Vince has managed to put aside lots of cash by selling pot and stolen credit cards. And then there’s the donut job—which gives him more pleasure than he could have imagined going in.
Still, Vince feels something missing in his life—a purpose. As Carter and Reagan prepare to debate the country’s future, Camden begins to see the election as a symbol of his becoming a part of society. His vote takes on a mythic quality and heroic dimensions. Unfortunately, the other parts of his life start to come apart when a stone-cold hired killer called Ray Sticks turns up in Spokane like a beetle-browed avenging angel.
There are some perfect gems of Waugh-like humor in Walter’s story—like the woman who wants him to endorse the luckless third party candidate John Anderson, or the way Kelly’s boss uses his hunting skills to defend Vince. But what it all really adds up to is what a person thinks is important—to himself, the people around him, the place where they live.
To the question asked by Ronald Reagan during the 1980 campaign—“Are you better off than you were four years ago?”—Vince finally comes up with an answer that works for him. “…I think a guy could move across country, change his name, job his friends—change everything… And not really change at all.”
6
Mysteries Under Fire
Mysteries set in times of war have an unusual role—proving that the “dreams of justice” which crime solving tries to accomplish can take place while apparently more unjust amounts of death continue. Memorable series have centered around the American Civil War, World War I and World War II. Of special note is a remarkable work called “The Berlin Trilogy” by Philip Kerr—three linked stories set in Germany just before, during and just after World War II.
The American Civil War still eats at our public and private hearts—a national obsession that has produced such fine novels as “The Killer Angels”
The murder of Janelle Vonn is the backbone of Parker’s novel: it changes the lives of every other character. But the dead girl is more than the center of a first-rate mystery. She had enjoyed some fame:
“Got her picture taken a lot. Tustin people thought she looked like the old SunBlesst girl, so they did up a poster of her with oranges, an old-fashioned kind of picture that made her look really pretty and made it seem like Tustin still had orange groves…”
CITIZEN VINCE, by Jess Walter (Regan/HarperCollins)
I can see the headlines now: “LOCAL DONUT MAN’S LIFE CHANGED BY VOTING.” The fact that the man in question is Vince Camden, a 36-year-old credit card scammer, expert poker player, small-time drug dealer and indeed a maker of excellent maple bars, and that his voting choice is between Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter in 1980, gives Jess Walter’s combination of immensely entertaining crime thriller and wry social commentary a decidedly different series of twists, and mark it as a sure candidate for one of the best books in recent genre memory.
Camden, not the name he was born with in New York City, now lives as a protected government witness in Spokane, Washington—a town (Walter’s home) described with a totally understandable mixture of love and contempt. A smart and touching hooker named Beth, studying for her real estate license, shares his affections with Kelly, a sleek blonde who wants him to work for the election of her lawyer boss, a rising Republican. In the three years since he accepted a Federal offer and blew the whistle on same made guys in New York, Vince has managed to put aside lots of cash by selling pot and stolen credit cards. And then there’s the donut job—which gives him more pleasure than he could have imagined going in.
Still, Vince feels something missing in his life—a purpose. As Carter and Reagan prepare to debate the country’s future, Camden begins to see the election as a symbol of his becoming a part of society. His vote takes on a mythic quality and heroic dimensions. Unfortunately, the other parts of his life start to come apart when a stone-cold hired killer called Ray Sticks turns up in Spokane like a beetle-browed avenging angel.
There are some perfect gems of Waugh-like humor in Walter’s story—like the woman who wants him to endorse the luckless third party candidate John Anderson, or the way Kelly’s boss uses his hunting skills to defend Vince. But what it all really adds up to is what a person thinks is important—to himself, the people around him, the place where they live.
To the question asked by Ronald Reagan during the 1980 campaign—“Are you better off than you were four years ago?”—Vince finally comes up with an answer that works for him. “…I think a guy could move across country, change his name, job his friends—change everything… And not really change at all.”
6
Mysteries Under Fire
Mysteries set in times of war have an unusual role—proving that the “dreams of justice” which crime solving tries to accomplish can take place while apparently more unjust amounts of death continue. Memorable series have centered around the American Civil War, World War I and World War II. Of special note is a remarkable work called “The Berlin Trilogy” by Philip Kerr—three linked stories set in Germany just before, during and just after World War II.
The American Civil War still eats at our public and private hearts—a national obsession that has produced such fine novels as “The Killer Angels”
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