The Demon Dog of American literature on what attracts and repels him about Los Angeles
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L.A. magnetized me at birth. A demonic doctor implanted a microchip in my brain and hooked it up to a signal transmitter in the Hollywood Hills. Little beeps bip into my skull. Picture postcards pulse my way. I can run -- but I can't hide.
I split L.A. in '81. It was too familiar. I'd never been anywhere else. I wanted to break the literal magnetic pull and remagnetize myself anew. I wanted to collect period postcards and write novels about a vanished L.A.
I embarked on that course. I exiled myself from the physical boundaries of my smog-shrouded fatherland. I lived in New York and Connecticut. My brain bristled and broiled with outtakes from L.A.'s real past. I revised that past and lost sight of what was real and what wasn't.
I wrote four big L.A. period novels. I took L.A. then as far as it could go. I vowed to move on and write novels set in other locales. I didn't want L.A. to impinge me. I wrote the first book of a new trilogy and set it largely outside of L.A. I breathed the freshly corrupt air of Chicago, Miami and D.C. in the Kennedy era. It filled my lungs. It felt good.
Events interceded. I was offered the chance to write a book-length memoir. The job entailed an extended stay in 1994-95 L.A.
I took it. I did my research and moved to Kansas City. I wrote my memoir there. I learned the true meaning of "You can run -- but you can't hide."
I reinstated my L.A. abstinence vow. It was futile. L.A. owns me.
I granted myself a short-fiction escape clause. Now I write short stories about the old L.A. and eschew L.A. in my novels. It's a satisfactory compromise. It allows me to swim in L.A.'s historical gutter and avoid fictional contamination. It allows me to love L.A. -- in a controlled fashion.
I'm not an L.A. expert or an L.A. pundit or an L.A. seer. I have no insights on L.A., the Queen City of the Pacific Rim or L.A., the Multi-Cultural Hellhole. The defining presence of the movie business eludes me. I'm not being disingenuous here. Let me cite my all-purpose escape clause.
I'm from L.A. Thus, I possess the right to reclaim my hometown through fiction and refrain from hopped-up abstractions about it -- then and now.
You're not from L.A. You're here for the BEA bash. You're most likely quartered in a shitty downtown hotel. You can't roam too far west. You need to eat. You need to sniff smog so you can say you've been to L.A. You need a post-hip tour guide to point you to some venerable spots. Dig it: It's me.
Eat at the Pacific Dining Car on 6th and Witmer. It's a swank steakhouse just west of downtown. It's open 24 hours a day. It's dark. It's ritzy time-warp in the middle of a poverty zone. You'll feel virtuously affluent there. The food's great. Look up Kevin and Mike Green -- the managers -- and tell them I sent you. Chat up Ron, the wine steward. Dig on the old L.A. Get a doggie bag and toss some scraps at the winos and homeless geeks in the park across the street. Revel in your status as a bookseller on an expense account.
Hotfoot it out to the Korean nightclub strip on Olympic. Dig the bands singing covers of Carpenters songs in Korean. Dig the absence of the English language and learn to point to the bottles behind the bar to indicate your drink of choice. Attempt to impress the B-Girls and nude dancers with the fact that you are a member of the sexiest profession on earth. Bookselling!!!!! Do not mention my name -- these people do not know who I am and don't speak English, anyway.
Swing northwest and dig the Latin gang turf around Beverly and Virgil. The hilly terrain, rundown and woodframe houses and beer billboards in Spanish are a gas. Stop at the Lowenbrau Restaurant for a nightcap. It's a German joint in the middle of Little Calexico. The walls are lined with ale steins, antlers and hand-carved knickknacks. Dig the culture clash! Dig the acid-flashback décor! Dig the drunken deputy district attorneys weaving at the bar!
Dip southeast and tool by the lake at MacArthur Park. Pick up the raucous vibes of J Wambaugh's magnificent novel, The Choirboys. Peruse the lake. Recall the groovy killing that Wambaugh set there. Avoid stray bullets and errant soccer balls. Call in a sandwich order to Langer's Dell at 7th and Alvarado. They'll bring it out to your car. Keep the motor running. Don't risk death by stepping out on the sidewalk.
Bop back northeast. Dig the L.A. Sheriff's Crime Lab at Beverly and Alvarado. Zip by Belmont High School: home of winning football team and gang rumbles. Prowl the outskirts of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion at the Music Center. Roll your windows down and pick up symphonic melodies.
They might be bracing Bruckner or rapacious Rachmaninoff. It's noxious nachtmusik to noodle your noggin. It's a noir nocturne to nudge your nightly nightmares. It lacerates and liberates your new lascivious L.A. libido.
Feel good about yourself. You're a bookseller. You're not a movie-biz fool who has to live here. You came to L.A. and cavorted in a post-hip manner. That makes you hipper than hip.
