Slipstream: A Novel

Enjoyed the interesting, complex characters in this fast moving novel. Great summer read!

Slipstream, $23.95 US, is an impressive novel from Berkeley author Leslie Larson that you'll probably find enjoyment in. Set in Los Angeles, this drama examines the lives of five characters that all happen to intersect in one place -- LAX. Have you ever been through Los Angeles International? Larson uses metaphorical arrivals and departures at the terminal to illuminate the desolation and melancholia of the city. Look at some of Larson's characters: Rudy Cullen, he's lost his supervisory job cleaning jets; Inez Cullen, she's Rudy's Avon-selling soon-to-be ex-wife; Tommy Wylie, he's content bartending to anxious travelers; Logan Wylie, he's Tommy's just-released jailbird brother; and finally Jewel Wylie, she's niece to Tommy -- the estranged daughter of Logan -- and a student at UCLA. Unknown to the five, they're all headed for sorrow. If Leslie's book succeeds, it's because she creates vivid portraits: "The guy gave Wylie a quick once-over. Summed him up and kissed him off. The uniform probably had a lot to do with it, Wylie thought -- the black slacks and the putty-colored polo shirt that said TOP HAT ENTERPRISES over the breast pocket." Larson's deliberate eye and measured descriptions elevate her writing to high literature. Perhaps you've seen guys like Tommy Wylie before, but do you know their ambitions? Larson wants you to notice the service people you bypass every day, and ponder their lives. She relates how others see Wylie: "He didn't suspect that Wylie could play slide guitar, frame a house, and smoke a salmon to perfection." Wylie's clearly an ignored character. All of Larson's characters are similarly neglected. Something about Larson's writing just screams social injustice. Who are all these lower-middle class people in Los Angeles, and why are they being squeezed out of a place to live? For example, why would Jewel continue to live with Celeste (and baby-sit Celeste's daughter Rachel without pay) when it's clear that Celeste is really in love with Dana? Celeste is clearly taking advantage of her kindness. The genius of this book resides in the slow manner in which Larson transforms her book from a slice-of-life drama into a highly focused thriller. Tommy is jittery when he's on-shift at the bar in the pavilion at LAX, but is that because of episodes spawned from his time in Vietnam decades ago, or a more immediate threat? Celeste is similarly spooked by an ominous outdoor warning system on the UCLA campus. All the foreshadowing pays off later. Rudy is likable at first, since Glenn Waller unceremoniously laid him off from his ground support job with the airline industry in Chapter 2. Readers are initially sympathetic to him, until Larson clues you in that he may not be a worthy guy. His wife Inez has been secretly plotting to leave him, with daughter Vanessa in tow, for months now. Even though his dismissal was pretty awful, you've got to wonder why Rudy can't just shake it off and transition. He goes home to In

I think of literary fiction as being more "character driven" and genre fiction (suspense, mystery, etc.) as being situation driven. What intrigued me about Slipstream is that it is primarily character driven but has all the page turner characteristics of the best genre fiction. There are 5 primary characters in Slipstream, and they were all very different from each other. Yet the author seemed intimately familiar with them all. Of the male characters I kept thinking, only a man could have written that. And of the female characters, I felt that only a woman could have had the minute insights into the female personalities being described. The characters seem to be drawn in 3D relief, some are pathetic, others are weird, others likable, etc. Somehow a tension is introduced into all of this, making you wonder what's up with these people, where they're going, what's going to get in the way. I really admired the author's ability to get into the hearts and souls of these people that habitate the "just a step or two away from the skids" regions of society we are all familiar with, while keeping me entranced with wondering, what's going to happen next?

Slipstream has intense, sad, unforgettable characters and a mood and setting you can get lost in. I loved the author's lyrical voice and amazing eye for detail. This is a side of Los Angeles (and the airport) that you don't often see in fiction--no movie stars, no plane crashes, but a narrative and voice that get under your skin and stay with you long after you've finished reading the book. Highly recommended.

I enjoyed this first novel by this author. I won't tell you the plot, or give away the ending. It is a story about 5 very ordinary people living in Los Angeles. They are a long way from rich, beautiful and glamorous. They are exactly the opposite. The characters are very common. They face their share of failures and set backs. It is not a thriller, but a human drama. All the action in this book is at the very end.