Silver Lake

by Peter Gadol

Two architects, two men turning forty who have been involved professionally and personally for twenty years, are beginning to see their practice and their marriage falter. One Fall day, a peculiar young man drifts into their storefront office claiming he has car trouble, asking to use the phone. The men get to talking; the young stranger is curious but enchanting, and one of the architects ends up playing tennis with him that afternoon, ultimately inviting him home for dinner. The ensuing evening involves a lot of wine and banter and then increasingly dark conversation, and when the stranger has had too much to drink, the two men insist he sleep in their guest room. During the night, the stranger commits an act of violence which shatters the architects' ordered lives, each man in his own way over the days and months that follow coping with blossoming doubt and corrosive secrets.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Contemporary, LGBT, Gay, M M Romance

296 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2009

Reviews

[Maicie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very dark, angst-filled story.

Robbie and Carlo are life and business partners. They meet a young man and invite him into their home. When the guest becomes too drunk to drive home they invite him to spend the night. While they are sleeping the guest commits a violent act at their home.

The ensuing story is more true-to-life docudrama than a mystery or thriller. It made an impression.
.

[Chris · Rating 3 out of 5]

Peter Gadol’s sobering novel, Silver Lake, is a profound meditation on long-term relationships and a grim portrayal of one couple’s instability in spite of their longevity.

Carlo and Robbie met in college and have been together for twenty years. Partners in business, as well as in life, their architectural company, Stein Voight, is showing signs of failure, and the underlying financial stress has carried over to their life at home in Silver Lake, outside of Los Angeles. Yet everything appears mostly okay on the surface.

Their life is soon thrown for a loop when a seemingly innocent passerby with car trouble enters their shop and asks to use the phone. In the time it takes for help to arrive, Robbie becomes better acquainted with the young stranger, Tom. Soon thereafter, Robbie challenges Tom to a game of tennis then invites him to stay for dinner.

A meal and several drinks later, the conversation becomes especially intense and noticeably awkward among the three men. Discomfort aside, Carlo and Robbie convince Tom to spend the night rather than drive in his condition. They wake the next morning to find Tom hanging from a tree over their deck, apparently having taken his own life.

While Tom’s suicide raises many questions, the most unsettling mystery is its immediate effect on the couple’s relationship. Robbie becomes withdrawn, fails to show up at work and refuses to believe Tom purposely killed himself, so he spends his days trying to learn more about him.

Carlo also distances himself--more so because Tom wasn’t a complete stranger to him--filling his days with projects around the house and bonding with Gabriel, a neighborhood teen he has known since he was born, all the while neglecting a potentially lucrative client.

Godol’s writing effectively conveys the melancholy of relationships that have fallen into a rut by default. Prior to Tom’s arrival, both men would likely have claimed to have been perfectly content in their relationship. As each discovers how the other is coping with the recent tragedy, without ever asking upfront, it is disturbing, as well as disheartening, for the reader to witness the unraveling of their two decade history because of a single day’s events.

The story isn’t particularly uplifting, the mood throughout is mostly unsettling, and the storyline may not seem plausible, but the emotional journey of the two main characters, both of whom make some questionable decisions, is painfully real.

Therefore, while it may not be the feel-good-beach-read of the season, Silver Lake succeeds as a poignant novel.

[Georgia Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Robbie and Carlo have been romantic and business partners for over 20 years, living and working happily as architects in Los Angeles. Robbie is a sensitive, free-spirited idealist who was instantly enamored with the confident, intellectual Carlo when they met in college decades prior. They spend their days drafting up glamorous homes for Hollywood elites, tending to their expansive property, growing and cooking their own food, and cherishing their loyal bond to one another.

This idyllic existence is interrupted when a mysterious, troubled man named Tom Field stumbles into their lives. Empathic Robbie invites Tom over for dinner, hoping to make him feel a little less alone. The night takes a dark turn, and in the morning Robbie and Carlo wake up to find Tom has killed himself on their property. This traumatic event drives a wedge in the couple's relationship, exposing secrets and anxieties that had been hiding beneath the surface. Robbie and Carlo begin to question how one can be both in love and entirely alone.

This is a beautifully written novel with plenty of meditations on the inner-workings of intimate relationships and what it means to be lonely and misunderstood. Gadol is a very talented writer who carved a unique, psychologically-driven story of a relationship gone wrong, while maintaining empathy for each of his characters. A strange thanksgiving dinner with Field's elderly father in attendance is a prime example of his gift for dialogue and capturing the complex humanity behind the things we say and do. My only complaint is the side plot involving neighbor kid Gabriel, who had no redeeming qualities and didn't seem to match his characterization as a "sweet kid" for an instant. I will also note I found Robbie to be an easier character to connect with than Carlo, since he is much more expressive of his feelings and shortcomings, while Carlo can sometimes read as slightly bland/underdeveloped.

However I highly recommend this book for its strong writing and well-crafted slow-burn narrative.

[Teresa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very atmospheric storytelling based in an area I lived in for 20 years. While the author only described a place and didn’t actually call it by name, I recognized all of them, which was fun. The story while a page turner is really in the “did he or didn’t he” style - did the guest commit suicide or was it made to look that way? And brings to light the somewhat complicated relationship of the gay couple at the center of it all. For me though it takes a bit too long to get to the answer and near the end feels repetitive. And SPOILER ALERT - after all that, did the couple really get back together and just go on with their lives? You do want them to but at the same time real life doesn’t often tidy itself up that way.

[Pia]

Too many pet peeves for me to enjoy this book at all. From comma abuse, to run-on sentences, to a false ending (oh, please never do this!), to misplaced words and phrases, to rambling descriptions, internal monologues, and side trips that had little to nothing to do with the main story, I couldn't stay lost in this tale. The first rule of a good book (in my opinion) is suspending disbelief, and that simply wouldn't happen with Silver Lake.

I must say, I do like a good depressing story, and this was sad, but it was also frustrating because for most of the book I couldn't have told you the theme of the story. I didn't grow to care about the characters -- Carlo with his silence and guilty conscious deserved worse, and Robbie was, well, over the top with his painful optimism, bordering on naivity -- so it was hard to feel for their pains.

I did like Tom, as odd as he was, I could believe in him. He was real. And I liked Jay, another side character. But these two couldn't carry the story.

Overall, while free, I couldn't recommend this writing style or story.

[Grey853 · Rating 2 out of 5]

If you like a straight-forward thriller with likable characters, this is not the book for you. I really didn't like the two main characters Robbie and Carlos at all. They've been together for 20 years, but one couldn't tell it from the way they behaved.

Plus, the narrative was all over the place, moving back and forth in time, changing point of view, and telling several stories at once.

It's a shame, too, because I really would've liked more insight into Tom, the young man who ends up committing suicide in the couple's home. Even when the possible motivations are explained at the end of the book, I didn't buy it. The character had potential, but wasn't really developed.

The resolution wasn't satisfying, either, so don't look for a happily ever after ending.

[Jennifer Barbee · Rating 4 out of 5]

This novel took me by surprise. It had this ominous modern noir feel to it, while remaining decidedly literary. I loved how Gadol really pulled the loose string on the protagonists' relationship and allowed himself to pull it very slowly, so that the unraveling would be tense and gradual.

I picked up the book from my library's "local fiction" shelf, because it is set in the neighborhood in which I have lived for the past dozen years. It added even an extra element to imagine all of this happening just down the street. The characters, already, were very realistic, but the notion that I could pass them on a stroll around the reservoir or see them at the Trader Joe's added some gravity for me.

I quite enjoyed this read, and plan to pick up more of Gadol's work.

[Liam Ostermann · Rating 1 out of 5]

Judging by reviews many people seem to have liked, even loved this book, but I am not one of them - I got bored with the story, couldn't get into it, couldn't care about the two main protagonists - I am not sure I really cared about any of them or what happened to them - I certainly didn't finish the book - which may be a judgement on me but honestly life is to short and there are to many fine book to read, or reread, to waste it on stuff like this.

[Shirley Motel · Rating 4 out of 5]

A meditation on what it means to fear loneliness, even in the comfort of a solid relationship. What happens when our most loved one becomes our most mysterious? I was often reminded of Kundera's The Unbearable Lightness of Being while reading this quiet, wintery book.

[Kyle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Slow and smooth (not boring) dive into the crumbling psyche of two men who love each other, but can't quite bridge the gap. Not one character is the obvious favorite - I wanted to root for each on at certain points. Lovely read for a solo trip, late fall/early winter evening, or just because.

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

What an odd book. The main theme seemed to be that couples hide things from each other and those secrets sometimes come back to haunt them.

[Chris Berryman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was riveted to this tale from start to finish, and drawn into the psychology of the three main characters ... one of the best works of “gay fiction” I’ve read.

[Bob Redmond · Rating 4 out of 5]

Peter Gadol writes what he calls "moral thrillers:" a lawyer is involved in a hit-and-run, for instance (in his book THE LONG RAIN). The lawyer is then called on to defend the wrongly accused. What does he do?

In books reminiscent of THE TALENTED MR RIPLEY (Patricia Highsmith) or THE ICE STORM (Rick Moody)--which is to say, precisely written and forcefully paced--Gadol writes across genres of literary fiction and noir, making his novels mean something, but not at the expense of a good read.

In SILVER LAKE, his sixth novel, the apparently calm waters of a married couple's life are disturbed by the plunging intrusion of a stranger. What unfolds proves how unsettled those waters were in the first place, the author inexorably dredging the relationship. "Dredging" is too strong a word, though; unless it could be done with the archaeologists' small spoons and brushes, a mystery revealed each little detail at a time.

Gadol's writing is so delicately lovely, especially in the moments of tragedy, he invokes Hannah Arendt's question, "can something horrible be beautiful?" Indeed, in every relationship is this question of the human condition, in which we fail and fail, but maybe with some beauty. (Arendt might not agree with that conclusion, and to see where Gadol lands you'll have to read the book.)

I can't say a lot about the plot without spoiling it, except to say that there's possibly a murder, a fire, a lot of lies, a police investigation, a failing business, and some good food--not all in that order. It's a good read, as I say, and as Sarah Shun-Lien Bynum (National Book Award winner) says, it's "a haunting book full of both beauty and dread."

*

WHY I READ THIS BOOK: When I was six years old, my family moved from Westfield, New Jersey to rural Ohio, a possibly traumatic experience for me, as I lost my three friends in the process: Chip O'Neil, Chris Hose, and Peter Gadol, who lived in adjacent houses across the street. Some 25 years later (and in Seattle), I came across an event calendar for Elliott Bay Bookstore. One author was named Peter Gadol… wondering if it was any relation, I attended the reading. I knew, as soon as I saw the author hit the stage, that this was my long-lost friend. After the reading, I went to the signing table, saying "this might sound crazy, but--" Before I finished my sentence, Peter said "Bobby Redmond." I was delighted to find Peter again, and more so to discover that he was a writer. I've enjoyed reading Peter's books ever since.

[Juliet · Rating 3 out of 5]

Got this as a Christmas present. Finished it by the time I went to sleep Christmas Day.

A couple, Robbie & Carlo, befriend a fellow gay man, Tom, who is scattered, interested in all sorts of things and nothing. He plays tennis with Robbie, cooks dinner for the two of them, drinks a ton, and then when he is supposed to be spending the night in the guest room, hangs himself and commits suicide. Was it really a suicide, or something else?

Carlo apparently has met Tom before, but where, and in what capacity? What is Carlo not telling Robbie (or us, the readers)? Robbie grows suspicious but does not tell Carlo of his suspicions. He finds Tom's address book and starts calling Tom's ex-lovers & friends, and does not tell Carlo. Carlo & Robbie, whose relationship/marriage has been solid for 20 years, slide into mutual not-telling-each-other-ness, and thus drift apart. Strange acts of vandalism are perpetrated against their property. Both have different reactions and they don't talk about that either.

So the book turns on all that is NOT being said. Mainly, it's about how the relationship changes, or perhaps reveals fault lines that were already there, in this environment of not-talking. This middle section was a bit slow-going but I still found the changes in their relationship to be interesting. The "suspense" also hinges on information that is kept from the reader. Normally that annoys me, but I was willing to put up with some of that for a while. By the 3rd act, though, the author's bad habits increase. The author tells you that one of the characters confesses all -- but does not give you the conversation or any information about what he confesses! You're given one ending, and then told no, it doesn't happen that way -- but it COULD have. Ooh, deep. Everything about the 3rd act is rushed and sloppy and kind of annoying. The first 2/3 was OK, though.

Some other little annoyances: the typesetter thought it was OK to allow a word with a contraction to break at the end of a line before the contraction. For example: was-n't, or had-n't. I found that to be distracting. Running heads were missing from two pages, and in that messy last 3rd of the book, the typos increased in number. Seems like the publisher got tired in that last 3rd, too.

[Cheryl Klein · Rating 5 out of 5]

The most literary page turner or the page-turningest literary novel I've read in a long time. Silver Lake is the story of two men who have been together for twenty years, most of which have been devoted to making a good life even better: They have a house with a lake view, a semi-successful architectural practice and their weekends are devoted to tennis and expensive cheese. But while the core is not exactly rotten, there are definitely a few loose threads in the fabric of their relationship that could unravel if pulled. Enter Tom, a lonely and charismatic drifter who does just that.

The plot is actually much more interesting than that, but I don't want to give too much away. So I'll just name a few of the things I loved about this book: the all-too-rare in-depth examination of a long-term relationship (and a gay one at that); the way Gadol introduces new bits of backstory at just the right moments, making the reader as distrusting as the characters; his amazing ability to retell a story by shifting the angle of the camera; the idea that every relationship has a shadow history--a different way things could have gone; the reminder that it's healthy to be needy; the way a neighborhood where I know almost every store and corner becomes beautifully timeless. As I tore through it, I kept lamenting how few pages I had left.

[Larry H]

It's probably been about 8-10 years since Peter Gadol's last book, so when I discovered Silver Lake I fell on it like a soldier protecting his company from a grenade. Needless to say, I wasn't disappointed, except when I was faced with the prospect of another 8-10 year wait!



It's a lazy weekend, and Robbie and Carlo are doing some work in their architecture studio when a young man enters and asks to use the phone because his car broke down. After some conversation, Robbie and Carlo invite the man to play tennis with them and ultimately, have dinner at their home. The discussions that night (fueled by a lot of wine) turns a bit dark, but they invite him to spend the night in their guest room. What unfolds after they awake the next morning shatters their worlds. How they cope with this one act affects their lives in every way, and opens them up to secrets, lies and uncomfortable self-discovery.



Clearly I'm being a bit circumspect in describing this book, as you need to let the story unfold around you. While some of what happens I could see coming, some things surprised me, and overall, the book tugged at my heart and my mind. At times I got frustrated by all the things that Carlo and Robbie didn't say to each other, but I know that life is like that.



This is a fantastic book, and I'm sad to have finished it.

[Kat · Rating 5 out of 5]

The reviews noting the main characters as "wooden" and the prose "pretentious" are wrong, absolutely wrong. Robbie and Carlo are treated with ingenious sensitivity and the growing gulf between them, after twenty years of loving one another, sears itself across the reader's heart more with every page.

There is one sentence late in the book that, unfortunately, shatters the carefully constructed tension and invalidates the tenuous, dubious synchronicities to which the author has directed the reader's attention. It's possible that other readers won't agree with me on that, so I won't specify it.

I feel that the ending of the book is something of a copout, narratively speaking; however, I honestly feel that this book is more fable than confection, more moralistic than entertainment. Thus, the ending takes the high moral ground rather than the cheap, gravitationally-easy Hollywood tie-off.

It's rare, nowadays, for me to stumble upon a book that inspires me to examine themes, to place myself in the characters' shoes, or to ponder alternatives and consequences. This is the sort of book I want to talk to other people about, to start a book group to make others read it, to bludgeon list-makers with so that they understand what real writing, real story-telling, is actually about.

[Yvonne · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's been a while since I've read a more depressing book. What we learn about Robbie and Carlo initially is that they've been a couple for 20 years, they're both architects who work together in their own business and they seem to be content and happy with their lives. With that start, you know it could only go downhill from there, which it does.

Let's just say a young man enters their lives who is the catalyst for doom & gloom for this couple. I think this is basically an essay on how secrets and lives can ruin relationships. The premise and the details are not unrealistic in the sense that there aren't people who behave this way, but more like those people are dunderheads who you may not want to read about. Robbie & Carlo do the opposite of what you should do to keep anything strong and together to the point where you're wondering how did these people manage to stay together for 20 years in the first place. They don't and the story slants too much in the negative direction to be truly credible.

This story is written in such a way with lots of ominous foreshadowing and some information is held back from the reader to give it a suspenseful atmosphere. It's decently written but I can't really say I enjoyed it as it's not my favorite topic.

[Diane · Rating 4 out of 5]

I finished this book today and I really liked it.

Peter Gadol's writing is hard to describe...simple, yet descriptive. Particularly when he writes about scene settings and moods. I wasn't even looking to buy a book the day I picked this up. The cover drew me in first, and I read a page at the bookstore and I was intrigued with it...in a very simple, comfortable kind of way...I just wanted to see where the story was going to lead.

This book weaves an intricate story and tells how so many things can be connected by just one event. It's mysterious and you just don't know how things will end up, or where it's all going until the very end. Set in Silver Lake California, also made it enjoyable for me.


Charters: Carlo, Robbie, Tom, Jay, Gabrielle, Carlos' dad.

Favorite line from the book: "What a rare phenomenon it was to run into one's spouse out in the world".

[David]

Gadol uses the back drop of a mysterious death to explore the dynamics of a 20 year marriage. Tom, a friend of Carlo and Robbie (the couple), is found dead in their backyard. Sometimes the mystery of Tom's death is intriguing and sometimes it just seems like a grim and strange setting to dive into the issues in this long term relationship. Gadol rolls Carlo and Robbies' relationship in some soap opera infedilities and Hallmark TV nostalgia. Gadol's craftsmanship was highest by cutting the scenes within chapters in and out witholding just the right amount and revealing with great timing. Altogether, though, the lessons about maintaining openness and honesty with a spouse gets awkwardly shoved into a dark mystery.

[Calila · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not my usual fare but it was free (if I recall correctly) so why not? Definitely an interesting read. But I found the main characters to be really childish for 40-somethings, who were just very quick to throw away a 20 year relationship and treat it like nothing. I would've expected their behavior from a new couple or something. I understand that suicide impacts in ways you can't predict but this was a virtual stranger. Still it was well written and interesting enough that I didn't have to fight to finish it. I'm not sure how I feel about the ending but I supposed that it reflects true human nature a bit.

[Ray · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well written and magical and beautiful descriptions of the place. Definitely satisfied my craving for LA fiction. Reading about a modern middle-class gay couple was interesting for me as I am one. I think the delicate balance that exists for all of us in wanting to be alone and to be together was too sharply tilted toward the dark side. I will say that I normally hate 3rd person omniscient narration that hides some key plot point to build reader suspense. It worked oddly well thought went a little awry at the end.

[Skip · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lot of the writing seemed really pretentious. And I can't decide if it was intentional, or if this writer was really somehow trying too hard.
The guy who killed himself seemed pretty interesting and I would have liked to get to know him better. The other two assholes were sorta losers.... All of their cutsey attempts at suburbia and the way their life together was such a boring imitation of a straight marriage..... Complete with the lies....

[Craig · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a downer! But thoroughly enjoyable. The author's ability to paint a scene or a feeling makes the read worth your time. The 'event' seems a little far-fetched, but it's really about what it does to a committed relationship. Don't read it because it's a crime novel or who-done-it - it doesn't rate very high on those scales. Read it because it's about people and how they react to tragedy.

[Liz · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was decent and gets bonus points for taking place in the hood.

However, it hurt me to read this, literally. The copy I had was new from the library and the pages are so thick and stuff it required a lot of force to keep the book open. The publisher should really try out some lighter paper for future editions!

[Ashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautifully written book set in Los Angeles. I'll never get over the magic of reading a book that takes place in a neighborhood I know so well. It was surprisingly suspenseful and an intriguing story of long and short term relationships, secrets, trust, loneliness, and the patterns one can fall into.

[carelessdestiny · Rating 4 out of 5]

The way he made the writing seem to reflect the aesthetic tastes of the two protagonists was cleverly done. Functional, rational and sleek, the prose glided over the dark, threatening urban enviornment which felt like it constantly wanted to seep through the modernist surface. Even the way he couldn't make up his mind about the ending seemed to fit.

[Jack · Rating 2 out of 5]

I just couldn't get into this book at all. I found the two main characters annoying, and I had not interest in what happened to them.

[Hannah · Rating 3 out of 5]

the book grew on me. It was a bit long winded and corny at first but the depth of the relationship and how you can be together and grow apart hit home as the book continued.

[Bradley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book made me both hopeful and sad. It's about a gay couple and an event that tears them apart. It's about love and forgiveness and fidelity and the connection that people have with each other.