California Girl: A Novel - Hardcover

Parker, T. Jefferson

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060562366 ISBN 13: 9780060562366

Publisher: William Morrow, 2004

Synopsis

A different world then,
a different world now ...

California in the 1960s, and the winds of change are raging. Orange groves uprooted for tract houses, people flooding into Orange County, strange new ideas in the air about war, music, sex, and drugs, and new influences, ranging from Richard Nixon to Timothy Leary.

For the Becker brothers, however, the past is always present -- and it comes crashing back full force when the body of the lovely and mysterious Janelle Vonn is discovered in an abandoned orange-packing plant. The Beckers and the Vonns have a history, beginning years ago in high school with a rumble between the brothers of each clan.

But boys grow up. Now one Becker brother is a cop on his first homicide case. One's a minister yearning to perform just one miracle. One is a reporter drunk with ambition. And all three are about to collide with the changing world of 1968 as each brother, in his own unique way, tries to find Janelle's killer.

As suspects multiply and secrets are exposed, the three Becker brothers are drawn further into the case, deeper into the past, and closer to danger.

About this title

About the Author:

T. Jefferson Parker is the bestselling author of seventeen novels, including the Edgar Award winners California Girl and Silent Joe. Alongside Dick Francis and James Lee Burke, he is one of only three writers who has won the Edgar Award for Best Novel more than once. Parker lives with his family in Southern California.

From AudioFile:

Parker's twelfth novel is a family saga and whodunit set against the turbulent '60s. The Becker brothers grew up among the orange groves of Southern California, brawling and scrapping with the low-class Vonn boys through most of the 1950s. By 1967, Janelle, the tomboyish little sister of the Vonn boys, has grown into a cover-girl beauty with a tragic edge. When her decapitated body is found in an abandoned orange-packing plant, the Becker brothers struggle to find the truth amid conflicting politics and family secrets. Patrick G. Lawlor reads the novel with a precise deliberation that at first seems stiffly at odds with the sunny setting of the story. But as the novel proceeds, Lawlor loosens and the book takes on a life if its own. Dotted with cameos by Richard Nixon, Timothy Leary, and even a young Charles Manson, CALIFORNIA GIRL is a beautiful, moving, and memorable novel. S.E.S. © AudioFile 2005, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine

About this edition

• Publisher: William Morrow
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 0060562366
• ISBN 13: 9780060562366
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 384