La mayoría de la gente que llega a Huntington Beach –la meca del surf en el sur de California– lo hace en busca de sus olas y sus fiestas interminables.

Pero lo que Ike Tucker quiere es encontrar a su hermana y a los tres hombres con los que la vieron por última vez. Su búsqueda se convertirá en un viaje de autodescubrimiento rodeado de surfistas bronceados, atractivas rubias, moteros, punks y camellos. Joven e ingenuo, Ike se irá adentrando peligrosamente en las entrañas de una ciudad amable que esconde un violento submundo del que no le será fácil escapar.

Not a horrible novel by any stretch of the imagination, but not a great one either.

I'll be the first to reveal I know nothing about biker culture, surf culture, or drug culture, other than what I've read in books or seen on TV—in other words, likely highly stylized and sensationalized.

That being said, the author allowed easy access into all three of those worlds with a clean, sharp, well-observed writing style.

That being said, there's not a single likable character in this book, which is okay if the author can make them spellbinding enough to never want to look away. Nunn's characters are interesting, and they have depth, but my god, they do go on. If I had to get through one more of Hound's philosophical "brah" monologues, I may have set the book down.

But the thing that ruined it for me, to be quite honest, was the big event toward the end. You'll know it when you read it. It just struck me, after a very set-firmly-in-reality tone throughout, to take a turn into a fantastical Hollywood blockbuster sequence toward the end that really was unnecessary.

Overall, glad I read it, but I don't think I'll come back to Nunn's books anytime soon. ( )

A damn fun read, plotted in the tradition of Chandler, penned like a beatnik drug trip. ( )

I picked this up for the simple reason that it was set in Huntington Beach, CA. I've lived in HB for 40 years and skimming it took me back to about the time I moved here.

Ike Tucker was raised in San Arco by his grandmother and uncle. His father had abandoned him and his older sister Ellen, and later his mother ran off with another man. Two years back Ellen had left with a guy too. San Arco was a dry, dusty desert town with nothing to give anyone reason to go there or stay there.

Things changed for Ike when a guy, about Ike's age, drove up looking for Ellen's brother. He was dressed in nice clothes and drove a white Camaro. Ellen had told him her brother was a Harley rider and knew all about motorcycles.

The guy had come to tell Ike that his sister had been in Huntington Beach, had gone to Mexico with a couple of guys and never returned. The guy was a bit disappointed to find that Ellen's brother was not a Hell raising biker that could ride down and make life miserable for the guys and find Ellen. He did leave Ike with a scrap of paper and three names...the names of the guys Ellen had been with.

Ike decided he needed to go down to Huntington Beach and find his sister. He had never really been out of San Arco and wasn't sure what he would find. He had enough money for a bus ticket and to rent a place to stay.

Arriving there he found sun, surf, golden tanned surfers and sun-bleached blonde chicks. He also found the dark side of Huntington Beach; drugs, parties that could go on endlessly fueled by drugs, booze and sex. Also the violence that could erupt between surfers and bikers, or surfers when jockeying for prime territory on the waves. He also found that it wasn't going to be a simple thing of asking questions and getting answers.

The book is a combination of coming-of-age, surfing and the beach scene, and noir mystery. At times the writing is a bit wordy, but the author paints the scenes so that you can feel the sun or the nighttime, the salt in the air, the mood of the characters. He gives you written cues that trigger the images in your mind. He also weaves a complicated tale with a number of threads to be untangled to see the solution.

I found that this is the first in a trilogy written by Nunn. Also that Nunn was a Southern California guy who surfed and had the knowledge, which I think made the atmosphere palpable while reading. ( )

A gripping, dark, moody, atmospheric, suspenseful story. It's my kind of mystery in that, on review, not a whole lot happened, and yet it is an existential page-turner. As with many mysteries, the "resolution" is something less than the build-up. I'd always heard this was a classic and was moved to read it after seeing Nunn's name on Sons of Anarchy. I would definitely read more of his (and I see there's a new one out). ( )