Golden Days (California Fiction)

A fascinating book--in part because you know, from reading the inside book jacket synopsis and the hints in the narrative, that this will be a book about nuclear war. But the war doesn't happen until 5/6 of the way in...and up until that point, it's a book about a lot of things: female friendship, love, hope, fear, California. In our current time of irony and sarcasm, it was both refreshing, and a little difficult at first, to completely stay with the narrator as she begins to believe a self-help guru's spiel about light, positive energy, and how what you believe will come true. In the final portion of the book though, which describes what happened after the nuclear war - all the self help speak becomes incredibly moving, and the novel really deepened for me. The book relies a lot on voice, and sometimes I wished there could be more fully developed scenes, but there's enough specific imagery and beautiful details here and there to keep you grounded. The beginning and middle can be slow-going at times, but beneath the slowness is this incredible build-up of tension as the war nears. Written in 1986, some of the personal anger towards men seems old-fashioned in some regards--but seen in the context of an approaching nuclear war, which the narrator believes (probably true) will be caused by men, her anger becomes convincing and justifiable.

I first read this book when the cold war was still on, Ronald Reagan was president, and we were all afraid of Nuclear War. At the time, I found it one of the most intense, significant, but also funny and wonderful books I had ever read. Since then, I have thought about it occassionally, and even once picked it up -- but it seemed sort of dated.But now, ever since September 11, I can't stop thinking about it. I've read it again, and I have been recommmending it to everyone I know. All of a sudden, it couldn't be more pertinent, more important. Now, more than ever, we need to be reminded of a different kind of vision than the one's we see on CNN or read in the New York Times -- and this is just the book to do it.

The first two thirds of the book should be a joy to women who have had real relationships and professional careers, and survived after having lost such. The last third is chilling because of the 'bomb theme'. I suspect negative reviews are generated by people under 30 who simply haven't lived much (yet). Plus it might be hard to appreciate the tone of consumer excess and obsession if you never lived in California or a major metropolitan area.