Saralee Says
Talcott Garland longs for a simple life. To him that means teaching his law classes, caring for his son and loving his wife. Within a period of twenty-four hours, Talcott’s tranquil life as a law professor, husband and father is turned upside down. His ambitious wife Kimmer tells him there is an opening on the federal bench. She wants to become a judge immediately and then Talcott’s father is found dead of an apparent heart attack. Talcott must go back to this father’s home in Washington D.C. alone and deal with the normal events of the death of a family member — but his family is anything but normal.
Talcott’s father was the infamous Judge Oliver Garland, a conservative African American judge who was nominated to become a member of the United States Supreme Court. Talcott must come to terms with the effect Judge Garland had on everyone around him. That is what The Emperor of Ocean Park by Stephen L. Carter (Knopf) is about – Talcott is on a mission to learn all of his father’s secrets which include the real reason the late Judge Garland did not become a Supreme Court judge.
Were you very sympathetic to Talcott? What about his relationship with his wife and why didn’t he talk with his brother Addison or sister Mariah about their sister Abby who was killed years ago? If Talcott wanted a quiet life then why choose the legal profession where he would always be identified as his father’s son. What about the snobbery among the African American elite – is it any different that than it is in white high society?
What exactly was Ocean Park and which character is the Emperor? Is the title “emperor” appropriate? Does our book club still think there are segregated vacation areas and if so, why? Which character in the novel has the most redeeming characteristics? What about the references to the game of chess that the author used to give the reader clues about the plot – did you find the strategies about chess entertaining or frustrating?
The war between the haves and the have nots, the struggle for power, payoffs, murder, and influence peddling make a compelling story and author Stephen L. Carter has managed to pull it off. Carter is not a stranger to law since he has been on the faculty of Yale Law School for more than 20 years. This is one of the best novels I have read in a long time. It is not often that I want to read a book that is 600 pages long but I read every word of The Emperor of Ocean Park because it is simply a fascinating story. Sooner or later, every book club will select this work for an in-depth discussion because it has all the ingredients for dialogue including, controversy, race relations, history, politics, sex, and the conflict between the rich and powerful and the haves and the have nots. Carter’s non-fiction books including The Culture of Disbelief are great but this is one reader who is eagerly awaiting his next work of fiction.
Larry’s Language
The wizardry of the children’s story about The Emperor’s New Clothes is that all the rulers’ subjects believed that the Emperor’s royal clothing was wondrous and glamorous even though they did not exist and he was naked. In this first novel, The Emperor of Ocean Park by distinguished Yale University law professor Stephen L. Carter, the emperor is Judge Oliver Garland who has just died of a heart attack.
Well, actually he only used to be a judge and actually it may have been a CIA assassination plot or a left wing conspiracy, not a heart attack. Judge Garland was once nominated for the Supreme Court but defeated when his law clerk and official court records evidenced that the judge had been meeting with Jack Ziegler, who was reputed to be a criminal of world renown but had been acquitted at each of his trials.
Now at the judge’s funeral, Jack Ziegler appears and assures the judge’s son Talcott Garland that no harm will come to Talcott or his family. Since Talcott believed his father died of a heart attack this guarantee of safety comes as a shock that serves to energize Talcott’s sister in her search to prove that the judge was murdered.
Talcott only starts to believe when he goes to the Garland family vacation home at Martha’s Vineyard and finds a bizarre letter from his father promising that there are certain secret “arrangements” that must be met. The plot of this novel is driven by Talcott’s inner journey to figure out his father’s life, his father’s failure to attain the Supreme Court and the meaning of his father’s letter. While there is great intrigue and mystery as several competing groups harass and threaten Talcott over the “arrangements,” the true heart of this story is the personal relationships which are intense but curiously flat in emotion.
What are the marital rules of fidelity and faithfulness between Talcott and his brilliant lawyer wife Kimmer? Are there professional obligations among members of a university faculty (Talcott teaches law at an Ivy League school) which outweigh personal and career goals? Does Talcott live up to the judge’s saying that “friendship is a promise of future loyalty, loyalty no matter what comes? Promises are the bricks of life and trust is the mortar.”
Actually, in the twists and turns of Talcott’s search to know his own father while his estranged wife Kimmer seeks a federal judgeship appointment, the real conflict is between Talcott’s memory of his father and his father’s hidden life. Several of the bad guys warn Talcott without success not to pursue his father’s “arrangements” but the advice Talcott should have heeded was his older brother who warned that children should not learn about the sins of their father.
As we travel down (and it is down unfortunately) this path with Talcott, some of the most interesting aspects of the book are what you can learn about east coast African American social structure in dating, vacationing, and career paths as well as chess strategy. Poor Talcott is eventually too clever by half as he defeats the bad guys in his quest for knowledge and would have been better off to have failed.
Just in time for basketball and March Madness, our next selection is My Losing Season by Pat Conroy.
