Ever since John Grisham released The Firm
back in 1992 and single-handedly popularized
legal fiction, dozens of wannabe legal
fiction best-selling authors began to pen
potential blockbusters. Unfortunately, none
of them met with much success. Now, esteemed
Yale Law School professor Stephen L. Carter
has decided to try his hand at this genre
but with a twist. His debut novel, The
Emperor of Ocean Park, concerns the upper
elite of African Americans in the legal
profession, a subject most Pakistanis know
as much about as perhaps the history of
Russian aristocracy.
A leading African American public figure,
Carter studied law at Yale University before
clerking for Supreme Court Justice Thurgood
Marshall. He has previously written
critically acclaimed nonfiction books on
subjects including affirmative action, the
judicial confirmation process, and the place
of religion in our legal and political
cultures. The Emperor of Ocean Park
is his first work of fiction.
The Emperor of Ocean Park is
essentially a game of chess between the
blacks and the whites of the upper crust of
American society. Just like the Cosby Show
in the eighties was a look at the daily
lives of wealthy African Americans, this
novel is a snapshot into the legal
profession from the point of view of African
American protagonist Talcott "Misha"
Garland, the son of Judge Oliver Garland,
who was once nominated for a Supreme Court
seat. The hero is married to ambitious,
snooty legal eagle Kimberly "Kimmer" Madison
who makes three times the salary he does as
a law professor. Despite the pseudo coziness
of his tenured Ivy League career, his
glamorous wife and infant son, he struggles
to maintain the facade of a happy and
dutiful husband, while fully aware of her
affairs and waning interest in their
marriage. Soon, however, he and we learn
that he has much more to worry about than
the state of his marriage.When his father,
the judge, is found dead in his study,
Garland finds himself probed for the
mystifying "arrangements" his father left in
his care. FBI men straight out of X-Files
come calling in search of sensitive client
documents. A preacher friend gets brutally
murdered, and then their family house in
Martha's Vineyard is vandalized. Perplexed
and confused, Garland tries to unravel the
past of his powerful father and finds out
more than he originally bargained for.
Garland's rich sister Mariah who's married
to a white, corporate magnate believes their
father was murdered for the volatile secrets
he held, while their elder brother Addison
only wants to be left out of the
investigation. At this point, the story
turns into a mystery novel and the overly
long trail leads naturally to the upper
echelons of the US establishment.
Simultaneously, it leads in another
direction, as well, through the lives of a
fascinating and by and large unexplored
aspect of American society. The isolation of
the political process and the collapse of
the fragile house of cards that is the
modern racial solidarity (achieved through
"fancy college degrees and fancier money for
the few") are explored throughout the novel.
As a writer, Carter is at times wordy and
lacks Grisham's deft hand at relating a
story. At his best moments he exhibits a
Scott Turow-like ability to write
absorbingly about emotion and family ties,
but at his worst moments, he is simply
churning out pages after pages of filler,
possibly in hopes of being chosen for the
Oprah Book Club. His idea of connecting his
story to a game of chess is inspired,
however. In particular, when he relates the
Judge's views on chess, it is quite eerily
accurate to the state of race relations in
America throughout much of its history:
"...white moved first, white usually won,
black could only react to what white did,
and even if black played a perfect game he
still had to wait for white to make a
mistake before he would have any hope of
winning..."
Carter's novel essentially disputes the
long-standing notion that African Americans
born to wealth and privilege have it easy in
life. He deftly demonstrates that affluent
blacks still have to contend with racism,
temptation, jealousy, defeat and universal
problems such as adultery and overdue bills.
Pity he didn't do it in half the length. |
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