Praise for Karen Karbo
Karen Karbo is a very funny writer – from near slapstick to wry wit. Amazing.
THE NEW YORK TIMES
The Diamond Lane
•A New York Times Notable Book
A flawless, page-turning story … this is a tale to treasure.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
A wonderfully comic novel about savvy Hollywood outsiders trying to get in … not only is the plot ingenious, but the writing remains deft all the way through.
THE NEW YORK TIMES
It is a testament to Karbo’s skill at high comedy that the ending of this book – a funeral rather than a wedding – leaves you smiling.
THE NEW YORKER
This astringent, humorous novel tackles two subjects ripe for satire: the Hollywood movie industry and marriage – both notoriously fickle institutions requiring blind hope to sustain life.
THE LOS ANGELES TIMES
This kind of novel is a devil to pull off … and Ms. Karbo has done her job brilliantly.
THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
Julia Child Rules: Lessons on Savoring Life
I want to make wallpaper out of this original and beautiful book just so I can have Karbo’s unparalleled wit and wisdom always on hand.
CHERYL STRAYED, author of Wild
[A]nyone with even the slightest interest in cooking and pop culture may find it hard to resist this series of epigrammatic guidelines for living large, especially when they come from a master at doing just that.
THE LOS ANGELES TIMES
Karbo’s Kick Ass books follow a unique structural blend of biography and advice-giving. When you read Julia Child Rules, you not only learn more about Julia’s fascinating life, you come away feeling as though you can be a little bit like Julia too.
GLAMOUR
A lighthearted trek through a food icon’s life, studded with satisfying tips for modern living.
KIRKUS REVIEWS
This intriguing book is about how Julia Child became an icon, and Karbo attributes Child’s success to her unique view on life. Here, through a fun and engaging set of rules, Karbo instructs readers on how they can follow Julia’s example and find true joy in life, too.
FOREWORD REVIEWS
Karbo’s joyful take on the ebullient, self-described “California hayseed” will charm readers new to the twists and turns of Child’s life, as well as devoted fans.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Julia Child Rules is a blast.
HEADBUTLER
Out of all the other Julia Child literature that’s out there, Karbo succeeds in pointing out something that should be, but isn’t always, obvious to us: the way Julia lived life with abandon, first and foremost, was by not allowing her age or place in life to dictate her career.
THE BRAISER
You won’t get any gushing food description here. In its place you’ll find humor, a little heartbreak, and a lot of wit and grit to inspire your own inner Julia.
THE OREGON IAN
How Georgia Became O’Keeffe: Lessons on the Art of Living
“Georgia was a proto slacker,” writes Karbo. “There were days and weeks when she would read, spend hours tramping around outside, write letters, sew, and play dominoes. …But when Georgia worked, she worked her ass off.”
O MAGAZINE
Simply a revelation.
ELISSA SCHAPPELL, Vanity Fair
Karen Karbo’s fresh and revealing take on the epic life of Georgia O’Keeffe is both effortlessly entertaining and profoundly inspirational.
SHEILA WELLER, author of Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon
[I]ntimate, joyful, and absolutely fun biography …
JULIE METZ, author of the New York Times bestseller Perfection
I want to give this book to every young woman I know who’s setting out on her own in the world – not to mention the rest of us …
MEGHAN DAUM, author of Life Would Be Perfect If I Lived In That House
How perfect that a writer as thoughtful, original, and hilarious as Karen Karbo takes on as a subject as talented, passionate, and fearless Georgia O’Keeffe. The result is a fresh, funny, highly personalized take on “the nation’s greatest woman artist,” a meticulously researched, page-turning romp through the life of a painter whose days were as bold and unique as her art.
CATHI HANAUER, author of Sweet Ruin and editor of The Bitch in the House
PUBLISHER’S WEEKLY
[T]old with great wit and hilarity throughout. While O’Keeffe is already revered by millions of women and aspiring artists everywhere, Karbo’s original, wry analysis is bound to enrich her status even further.
SHELF AWARENESS
The Gospel According to Coco Chanel: Life Lessons From the World’s Most Elegant Woman
Karbo delivers a mini-biography, with perceptive and amusing commentary … The fashion is merely fascinating, a means to an end. The life lessons? For a woman trying to find a safe haven in America, this book delivers more wisdom – and wit – per page than Dr. Phil will dispense in a lifetime.
HEADBUTLER
Reading Karbo is like listening to a dear friend talk about the legendary designer over brunch. This is a fun, insightful look at the genius behind the little black dress.
THE LOS ANGELES TIMES
Anyone with a good sense of humor should hugely enjoy, or should I say enjoie, Karen Karbo’s funny and stylish take on Coco Chanel. Like a little black dress, this handy life guide will take you from day into evening. K.K. on C.C.: oui, oui!
HENRY ALFORD, author of How to Live: A Search for Wisdom from Old People (While They are Still on This Earth)
Wise, witty, and refreshingly colloquial, The Gospel According to Coco Chanel is an enchanting tour through the complex, often controversial life of fashion icon Chanel. Filled with relevant life lessons for the modern woman, this book is Karbo at her irrepressible best.
HILARY BLACK, author of The Secret Currency of Love: The Unabashed Truth About Women, Money, and Relationships
How to Hepburn: Lessons On Living From Kate The Great
Karbo presents all this heterodox advice with great humor, but there’s a point she’s making to sister Gen-Xers: Hepburn broke all the rules women were supposed to follow and still had a fabulous life.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
These days, women in Hollywood and everywhere else are following [Hepburn’s] fiercely independent lead – and Redbook contributing editor Karen Karbo is no exception. Her sassy new book, How to Hepburn: Lessons on Living from Kate the Great explains what we can learn from the iconic leading lady, who makes most of today’s heavy-hitting celebrities look pretty lightweight.
REDBOOK
Karen Karbo’s How to Hepburn: Lessons on Living from Kate the Great strides magnificently before our eyes, much as Hepburn did onscreen. Perhaps because Karbo’s mother turned to Hepburn and not Jackie Kennedy as her 1960s household saint, Karbo goes for honesty over hagiography – and still finds much for us to emulate. And Karbo has the same appetite for a good sentence that Hepburn had for life.
MORE
Karen Karbo manages to come up with some offbeat gems in her witty new book, How to Hepburn.
USA TODAY
… Captures Hollywood mores and largely succeeds as an homage to “Miss Hepburn.”
NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
In an interesting blend of self-help book and star biography, novelist Karen Karbo seeks to extract lessons from the life of Katherine Hepburn. How to Hepburn: Lessons on Living from Kate the Great is a fun and spunky take on the life of the star.
CH
RISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR
An exuberant celebration of a great original.
THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER
…A delightful, insightful little guide.
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER
…smart, witty and profound in a low-key way – everything you’d expect in a book by Karbo.
THE OREGONIAN
The Stuff of Life
•A New York Times Notable Book
•People Magazine Critics’ Choice
•Books for a Better Life Award finalist
•Winner of the Oregon Book Award for Creative Non-fiction
With generous honesty, Karbo describes nuanced moments of nearly excruciating tenderness, embarrassment, frustration, and love, balanced with passages of often side-splitting humor. A compulsively readable memoir about family and the writing life.
BOOKLIST
Karen Karbo is nothing if not funny, so you’ll forgive her – no, you’ll thank her – for not turning her chain- smoking father’s death from lung cancer into a Lifetime movie weepfest. Instead, this bittersweet book honestly shows death to be what it is: a part of life, with all its annoyances, inequities, miseries and joys.
PEOPLE
Karbo’s willingness to portray the tough business of grief and mortality in all its unmanageableness and confusion makes The Stuff of Life a book you want to keep reading, and laughing with, to the end.
THE SEATTLE TIMES
…The book works beautifully on many levels. A lively, insightful and astonishingly unsentimental read, it’s intensely funny in places.
THE WASHINGTON POST
Motherhood Made A Man Out of Me
•A New York Times Notable Book
THE NEW YORK TIMES
Brilliant! The righteous, thoroughly American Karen Karbo delivers a swift kick in the kegels to those sappy What to Expect When You’re Expecting moms in her funny and appallingly honest novel Motherhood Made a Man Out of Me.
VANITY FAIR
Trespassers Welcome Here
•A New York Times Notable Book of the Year
•A Village Voice Top Ten Book of the Year
The Russians have come – and they’re fascinating. Karbo’s first novel, about Soviet émigrés in L.A., has passionate characters colliding in love, jealousy, politics, and the ongoing cold war between the sexes. An extraordinary debut that combines compassion with raucous comedy.
THE NEW YORK TIMES
Copyright © 2014 Karen Karbo
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage-and-retrieval systems, without prior permission in writing from the Publisher, except for brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
“Paperback Writer” by John Lennon and Paul McCartney © 1966 Northern Songs Ltd. All rights for the U.S., Canada and Mexico Controlled and administered by EMI Blackwood Music Inc. under license from ATV Music (MACLEN) All Rights Reserved. International Copyright Secured. Used by Permission.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Karbo, Karen
The diamond lane / Karen Karbo.
pages cm
ISBN 978-0-99043-702-4
1.Man-woman relationships – Fiction.
2.Motion picture industry – Fiction.
3.Hollywood (Los Angeles, Calif.) – Fiction.
I. Title.
PS3561.A584D5 2014
813'.54–DC23
2013044757
987654321
Hawthorne Books & Literary Arts
2201 Northeast 23rd Avenue
3rd Floor
Portland, Oregon 97212
hawthornebooks.com
Form :
Adam McIsaac/Sibley House
Set in Paperback
Originally published in 1991 by G.P. Putnam’s Sons, New York
First Hawthorne Edition, 2014
Dedicated to my dad, Richard Karbo, and the memory of my mom, Joan Karbo A toast and a wink to my fine editor, Stacy Creamer
ALSO BY KAREN KARBO
Non-fiction
Julia Child Rules: Lessons on Savoring Life
How Georgia Became O’Keeffe: Lessons on the Art of Living
The Gospel According to Coco Chanel: Life Lessons from the World’s Most Elegant Woman
How to Hepburn: Lessons on Living from Kate the Great
The Stuff of Life: A Daughter’s Memoir
Generation Ex: Tales from the Second Wives Club
My Foot is Too Big for the Glass Slipper (with Gabrielle Reece)
Big Girl in the Middle (with Gabrielle Reece)
Fiction
Motherhood Made a Man Out of Me
Trespassers Welcome Here
For Young Adults
Minerva Clark Gets a Clue
Minerva Clark Goes to the Dogs
Minerva Clark Gives Up the Ghost
Contents
Introduction
Preface
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Introduction
Jane Smiley
EARLY IN THE DIAMOND LANE, KAREN KARBO ARRIVES at her subject (as opposed to her plot). Mimi FitzHenry, in her mid-thirties, works at a production company, where she reads scripts for a (small) living. Her sister, Mouse, is calling her collect from Africa, and she has to justify taking the call to her boss. She staves him off by telling him that her mother, Shirl, was hit in the head by a falling ceiling fan and needs surgery. Her boss says, “‘Where’d it happen?’
“‘Gateau on Melrose.’
“‘Good God, I ate there a couple weeks ago.’ Solly seemed both baffled and repulsed. He had never heard such a thing. Wasn’t bad luck and misery and brain surgery and estranged sisters the stuff of TV miniseries? How tasteless to drag them into real life.’”
But this is Hollywood, where real life and miniseries are only distinguishable by who is getting paid and how much. No one is more aware of this than Mimi, who embraces it, or Mouse, a year younger, who rejects it. How and why Mimi and Mouse are who they are and what will become of them when Mouse returns after sixteen years is the subject of Karbo’s novel, which is hilarious, dark, playful, edgy, ephemeral, and enduring all at the same time.
The Diamond Lane is Karbo’s second novel, first published in 1991, two years after Trespassers Welcome Here, a novel about Soviet emigres to L.A. Karbo was thirty-three years old. There is never a moment in The Diamond Lane where Karbo doesn’t know just what she is talking about – the movie business, how to drive across town, what it is like in Africa, how to put together an absurdly expensive wedding, what love feels like, what doubt feels like, what bulimia feels like, what despair and sibling rivalry feel like. Of course, Mimi and Mouse have lovers. Mouse brings her English boyfriend, Tony, home with her, her collaborator in her current project, a documentary about an African tribal wedding. Mimi has a clandestine relationship with Ralph, a married man, who is teaching the class she is taking in “How to Write a Blockbuster.” Ralph has never written a blockbuster, but he has plenty of students. And then there is Ivan.
Karbo doles out measures of information with exquisite literary timing, weaving each new outrage (according to Mouse) or prize
(according to Mimi) into her sour-sweet but always funny discourse. The reader comes to trust her completely – to wait patiently for the mystery to be solved because there will be so many sharp insights along the way. One of my favorites comes when Mouse is observing a friend of Mimi’s reading scripts. Karbo writes, “Each one took about ten minutes. She read the first ten pages, the middle ten, the last ten. If she liked those thirty, she’d go back and read the first twenty, the middle twenty, and the last twenty. If she liked those sixty, she’d go back and read the first thirty, the middle thirty, the last thirty, which generally amounted to the entire script.” Carole, the enviable reader, would rather go to nursing school.
Karbo has a wonderful gift for populating her novel with amusing and revealing minor characters. There is Lisa, the sound editor: “She worked sixteen to eighteen hours a day syncing up footsteps, thwoking tennis balls, high school boys playing the edge of their desks with number 2 pencils, rat-a-tat-a-tat-a-tat-a-tat-a-tat-a-tat. Every rat, every tat had to be there, and had to be in sync. Then, in the mix, the producer covered all of them with a song from the soundtrack album. It would have been a wonder if she wasn’t addicted to Lithium.” One of my favorites is Shirl’s sister, Auntie Barb, who lives in Boring, Oregon, where she cultivates her sense of superiority. “Your eyeballs are drifting all over the place,” said Auntie Barb. “Everyone here does that. They pretend they’re listening but all the while they’re looking around for somebody more interesting. In Oregon people look you in the eye.”
When The Diamond Lane first came out, it was admired for its edgy style and hailed, for good reason, as “a deft, tragicomic social satire – of Los Angeles and the movie biz in particular and modern mores in general – noteworthy for the complexity of its characters, crisp prose, and loopy comic style.” (Library Journal) The New York Times loved it – declaring it one of the best novels of 1991: “A wonderfully comic novel about savvy Hollywood outsiders trying to get in—and to juggle their disastrous but funny love lives.” In the twenty-two years since publication, things have changed – or not. Filmmakers do not, perhaps, lug around the miles of celluloid and the burdensome cameras and sound recorders that they once did. Mobile phones ring all the time now, and perhaps Solly can reach his target-connections in New York more readily that he could then (perhaps not), but the convoluted relationships between art and commerce, truth and fiction, love and rivalry, wit and sadness that Karbo explores in The Diamond Lane have not changed. This novel still feels knowing and audacious and up-to-the-minute.