When I came to California in spring 2005, seriously thinking about moving here for school, the place horrified me yet looked vaguely familiar. The reason for my initial disgust was because I had grew up in Connecticut, where I was surrounded by buildings that existed when the Revolutionary War came about. Then I went to school in a historic part of Maryland, and Civil War history was everywhere along with ancient buildings. There’s no question that history and old buildings makes a place look beautiful and enhance the charm. And… I was looking at the wide highways of Los Angeles, four-lane suburban streets, flat houses spread out, strip malls, neon signs, sun-beat and cracked concrete, and strategically placed trees. I could barely see a building that was older than 50 years or a thick patch of nature that wasn’t intensely landscaped. I felt so out of place, like I didn’t belong here, and I had a hard time seeing the beauty of Los Angeles – especially in the San Fernando Valley. It was as far away from comforts of what I had known all my life in a location as I could get – yet, why did it seem so strikingly familiar at the same time?
The answer was the books I had read and tucked away in the back of my mind, echoing yet never prominent.
Being a voracious bookworm, I was introduced to Francesca Lia Block when I was around the age 11 and fell in love with her succulent, heavily detailed and romantic description of Los Angeles and the magic emulating from characters that were glamorous and glitzy, sometimes tacky, yet always beautiful and charming. I would consume every book of hers until late high school (when I started reading more and more Marlowe, Ibsen, Orwell, and Atwood… it was simply natural that Block slowly faded away). I think every single one of her books have been a LA Times bestseller. Most dazzlingly, Block is best known for her ability to accurately capture South California. She was born and lived in LA her entire life, and she has professed her love for the "jasmine-scented, jacaranda-purple, neon sparked city" (Wikipedia) many times over in her writing. Here’s an excerpt of Francesca Lia Block’s writing – you can’t deny the Los Angeles flavor nor the unusual beauty of her effortless postmodernist prose geared for young readers:
“If Los Angeles is a woman reclining billboard model with collagen-puffed lips and silicone-inflated breasts, a woman in a magenta convertible with heart-shaped sunglasses and cotton candy hair; if Los Angeles is this woman, then the San Fernando Valley is her teenybopper sister. The teenybopper sister snaps big stretchy pink bubbles over her tongue and checks her lip gloss in the rearview mirror, causing Sis to scream. Teeny plays the radio too loud and bites her nails, wondering if the glitter polish will poison her. She puts her bare feet up on the dash to admire her tan legs and the blond hair that is so pale and soft she doesn’t have to shave. She wears a Val Surf T-shirt and boys’ boxer shorts and she has a boy’s phone number scrawled on her hand. Part of her wants to spit on it and rub it off, and part of her wishes it was written in huge numbers across her belly, his name in gang letters, like a tattoo. The citrus fruits bouncing off the sidewalk remind her of boys; the burning oil and chlorine, the gold light smoldering on the windy leaves. Boys are shooting baskets on the tarry playground and she thinks she can smell them on the air.” – Francesca Lia Block, “I Was a Teenage Fairy”
I’ve read over 10 of her books but my favorite would be “Violet & Claire” – a silver screen-spun tale about two girls’ friendship and dreams, set in Hollywood where stars are made or crushed. “Weetzie Bat,” her groundbreaking first novel is a classic about adolescents growing up in – where else? Los Angeles. Another good novel is “The Rose and the Beast,” which is basically a collection of fairy tales restyled and told with a postmodern Los Angeles touch and of course, Block's flair. I’ll close out this entry with yet another Block excerpt, this time from “Violet & Claire.”
“FADE IN:The helicopter circles whirring in a sky the color of laundered-to-the-perfect-fade jeans. Clouds like the wigs of starlets-fluffy platinum spun floss. Below, the hills are covered with houses from every place and time-English Tudor manors, Swiss chalets, Spanish villas, California Craftsman. Flowers threaten to grow over their doors and windows like what happened to Sleeping Beauty's castle. Pools flash like jewels in backyards where Sleeping Beauties in sunglasses float topless, waking to sip from goblets of exotica decorated with pineapples, cherries and hibiscus blossoms. On the roads that run between the hills are shiny cars, hard-candy-colored and filled with music.
This is how my movie begins. The credits floating in the pools, written on the license plates, on billboards, lighting up in neon over the bars..." – Francesca Lia Block, “Violet & Claire”
The answer was the books I had read and tucked away in the back of my mind, echoing yet never prominent.
Being a voracious bookworm, I was introduced to Francesca Lia Block when I was around the age 11 and fell in love with her succulent, heavily detailed and romantic description of Los Angeles and the magic emulating from characters that were glamorous and glitzy, sometimes tacky, yet always beautiful and charming. I would consume every book of hers until late high school (when I started reading more and more Marlowe, Ibsen, Orwell, and Atwood… it was simply natural that Block slowly faded away). I think every single one of her books have been a LA Times bestseller. Most dazzlingly, Block is best known for her ability to accurately capture South California. She was born and lived in LA her entire life, and she has professed her love for the "jasmine-scented, jacaranda-purple, neon sparked city" (Wikipedia) many times over in her writing. Here’s an excerpt of Francesca Lia Block’s writing – you can’t deny the Los Angeles flavor nor the unusual beauty of her effortless postmodernist prose geared for young readers:
“If Los Angeles is a woman reclining billboard model with collagen-puffed lips and silicone-inflated breasts, a woman in a magenta convertible with heart-shaped sunglasses and cotton candy hair; if Los Angeles is this woman, then the San Fernando Valley is her teenybopper sister. The teenybopper sister snaps big stretchy pink bubbles over her tongue and checks her lip gloss in the rearview mirror, causing Sis to scream. Teeny plays the radio too loud and bites her nails, wondering if the glitter polish will poison her. She puts her bare feet up on the dash to admire her tan legs and the blond hair that is so pale and soft she doesn’t have to shave. She wears a Val Surf T-shirt and boys’ boxer shorts and she has a boy’s phone number scrawled on her hand. Part of her wants to spit on it and rub it off, and part of her wishes it was written in huge numbers across her belly, his name in gang letters, like a tattoo. The citrus fruits bouncing off the sidewalk remind her of boys; the burning oil and chlorine, the gold light smoldering on the windy leaves. Boys are shooting baskets on the tarry playground and she thinks she can smell them on the air.” – Francesca Lia Block, “I Was a Teenage Fairy”
I’ve read over 10 of her books but my favorite would be “Violet & Claire” – a silver screen-spun tale about two girls’ friendship and dreams, set in Hollywood where stars are made or crushed. “Weetzie Bat,” her groundbreaking first novel is a classic about adolescents growing up in – where else? Los Angeles. Another good novel is “The Rose and the Beast,” which is basically a collection of fairy tales restyled and told with a postmodern Los Angeles touch and of course, Block's flair. I’ll close out this entry with yet another Block excerpt, this time from “Violet & Claire.”
“FADE IN:The helicopter circles whirring in a sky the color of laundered-to-the-perfect-fade jeans. Clouds like the wigs of starlets-fluffy platinum spun floss. Below, the hills are covered with houses from every place and time-English Tudor manors, Swiss chalets, Spanish villas, California Craftsman. Flowers threaten to grow over their doors and windows like what happened to Sleeping Beauty's castle. Pools flash like jewels in backyards where Sleeping Beauties in sunglasses float topless, waking to sip from goblets of exotica decorated with pineapples, cherries and hibiscus blossoms. On the roads that run between the hills are shiny cars, hard-candy-colored and filled with music.
This is how my movie begins. The credits floating in the pools, written on the license plates, on billboards, lighting up in neon over the bars..." – Francesca Lia Block, “Violet & Claire”
How very evocative of Los Angeles, indeed. :-)
