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Here's a way you know your book is having an impact -- when the New York Times national staff runs a feature on what people think about it. Los Angeles bureau chief John Broder's story yesterday from Corcoran, Calif. deals with the company town's reaction to The King of California: J. G. Boswell and the Making of a Secret American Empire, by Mark Arax and Rick Wartzman, a writer and the Business Editor, respectively, at the L.A. Times. As you'd expect, some of the locals who knew Boswell like it, some don't.
The book is selling well in the towns and cities of the Central Valley, from Bakersfield to Fresno, bookshops report. But in Corcoran, which has no bookstore, it is hard to find a copy, or even anyone who admits to having read it. The local paper, The Corcoran Journal, part owned by Boswell, has barely mentioned it. The only appearance in town by the authors was in a darkened high school gymnasium late last fall. A bare handful of the town's 10,000 residents showed up."We gave a reading to about a dozen enthusiastic folks, brave folks, I guess," Mr. Arax said. "They bought up quite a few books, maybe 50. That was our big Corcoran event."
Arax's first book, In My Father's Name, certainly had an impact. In it he basically solved the murder of his father. Tip from CaliforniaAuthors.com.
The book is available in the public libraries in Corcoran (where it's checked), Hanford, and Lemoore. It's also available in nearly every other public library system in the San Joaquin Valley.
It's checked out in most places.
I guess Boswell isn't THAT powerful
Posted by: Bob Timmermann at January 10, 2004 12:38 PMCorrect me if I'm wrong on this, but isn't Corcoran a has-been company town rather than a current company town? I thought the Boswell influence over much of the southern valley diminished years ago after he mechanized most of his operations and fired everyone. My impression of Corcoran is that if it's a company town, it's a company town of the state prison system, which is probably even worse.
Posted by: Mr. Ricey at January 10, 2004 02:16 PMYour right I grew up there and its a perty wack town and I worked for boswell and I got tired ot the same routine going to work and coming home and saying damn is this all Im going to be doing so I said fuck it and here I am in Phoenix having a blast I guess I got tired of working for boswell so I feel you there is some perty ingnorant people in that town some people are actually proud of being there I dont deny being born there but I tell everybody Im from Fresno or the county over so I could relate to your article
Posted by: Rodolfo Ornelas at February 2, 2004 10:24 PM
of LA Observed
Not shocking that the book isn't selling well in Corcoran. I grew up in the San Joaquin Valley in a town called Turlock. Population about 40,000; home to a Cal State campus, about 20 video rental places and every chain restaurant known to man. Number of book stores: Zero, unless you count the textbook store at Cal State Stanislaus. Once opens periodically, but always goes out of business within a year or two. And compared to Corcoran, Turlock is practically Paris. It's no wonder that none of the famous "Central Valley Writers" actually led much of their life there as successful grownups.
Posted by: Mr. Ricey at January 9, 2004 07:57 PM