Savages

You may ask: Who’s speaking here?

 

The author? In which case: thanks for the hostility, pal. I wish I’d stolen your damn book.

 

Or is it a character? In which case: seatbelts on, major attitude ahead.

 

Or --- I was an English major; I can always find a third choice --- is it bravura style, a “fuck you” to the conventions of narrative fiction, a construction as welcome as a politician who defends the Constitution?

 

I’m voting for #3. But then, I’ve read "Savages," Don Winslow’s 13^th novel. [To buy it from Amazon, click here [3]. For the Kindle edition, click here [5].] And I have returned from this delightful/horrible, funny/tragic experience much the better for the ride --- even though (or because?) the author seems to find no moral flaw in smoking (and growing) marijuana, frequent sex (including a threesome) and crime (lots of it, starting with the horticulture, moving on to the bribing of a DEA agent and culminating in mayhem).

 

It’s like this.

 

Chon’s a product of Southern California beach culture. Though not a surfer, he joined the SEALS. Was sent to “Stanland” --- Afghanistan. Learns that, after the first kill, it’s just a matter of putting assholes to sleep. Returns to the USA with PTLOST (Post-Traumatic Lack of Stress Disorder).

 

Ben‘s parents are liberal shrinks in Laguna Beach. He went to Berkeley. “Double major --- botany and marketing, and no one asked what he was up to.” Summa. Phi Bete. And now the proud father of the most potent grass in Southern Calfornia.

 

Let’s pause and consider just how good that dope is: “a plant that could almost get up, walk around, find a lighter, and fire itself up. Read Wittgenstein, have deep conversations about the meaning of life with you, cocreate a television series for HBO, cause peace in the Middle East.” Or, to put it in terms we all understand: You shouldn’t operate machinery if you take more than one hit.

 

Ben and Chon are partners. With a product of this quality, rich partners. They have a network of salesmen, a condo on a bluff overlooking Table Rock beach, long days playing volleyball. And they have a playmate, the beautiful Ophelia. Or O, as in Multiple O.

 

A nice life, right. Then why is Chon watching a video at at the start of the book of nine decapitated head?

 

Iraq? Insurgents?

 

San Diego. Marijuana dealers.

 

It’s almost comical. The Mexican cartel wants to expand. Into Southern California. Which means that Ben and Chon can no longer operate independently. A meeting is set up at a luxury hotel:

 

 

Very civilized. Very….American. But not to Ben and Chon’s taste, though they “appreciate the irony that the Mexicans basically want to turn them into field workers.”

 

You have to love irony when it shows up in a book about business. And you have to love a writer who breaks rules --- especially given the subject matter. Here is a page of this novel:

 

Which means your fingers will fly. You will be desperately amused. And sucked into Ben and Chon’s world, just because it’s so freakishly different from anything you know as reality.

 

Which is one of Winslow’s main points: We know nothing. And, increasingly, we’ll know less --- in Mexico, the drug violence is so extreme that reporters don’t dare write about it, lest they get blown away. And this violence is, in fact, crossing the border. And all of this could change if we legalized marijuana and let a million-plus people out of jail for minor drug offenses --- and none of it will, because our national discourse is so addled we actually think the worst Mexican criminals are men and women who come to America in search of a living wage.

 

Winslow’s rage at our stupidity and hypocrisy surge in this novel. So he rubs our faces in violence. I hated that this was the case --- a gun appears, and I get sweaty --- but the real subject of “Savages” is how certain scenarios limit your thinking and make you feel you have no choices: “If you let people believe that you’re weak, sooner or later you’re going to have to kill them.”  

 

Oliver Stone is directing the movie of “Savages.” Don’t wait. That is: If you can stand to pay for your pleasure --- if you are willing to deal with the inevitability of very ugly shit --- the first half of this book will delight you more than any hydro Ben could grow.