"Paradise Palms" by Paul Haddad

It’s 1957, and the Soviet Union and just launched Sputnik. The Shapiro family lives in Los Angeles and operates the Paradise Palms Hotel, a once-regal property that is aging something less than gracefully.  

Max Shapiro is the family patriarch, a rough-and-tumble sort who grew up in rough-and-tumble Chicago on the border between legality and gangsters. His four grown sons are Aaron, married with three children; fraternal twins David and Leo, both unmarried; and Rudy, the baby of the family who has never quite seemed able to grow up. David is the family caretaker and de facto leader; hotel staff bring problems to David, not Max. 

 

The story opens at the funeral of Marta, Max’s wife and mother of his four children. That Max had brought his girlfriend explains a lot about Max. That the girlfriend is named Kitty Kay explains a lot about her. Max and Kitty live at the hotel, as do David and Leo.

 

A new family wrinkle is added with the appearance of Rae, an attractive black woman who happens to be Max’s daughter from a liaison with a maid. To Max’s credit, he accepts her; he’s provided for her since her birth. The sons are thrown, and initially only Leo accepts his half-sister.

 

Paul Haddad

What the four sons and Rae begin to find is that Max and Kitty are entangled with the mob, and the mob is closing its fists around the Paradise Palms. It wants that property for what it’s worth is the high-flying real estate market of Los Angeles in the late 1950s. And the question they, and especially David, face is to what lengths they’re prepared to go to protect their father, the hotel, and the family. 

 

Paradise Palms by Paul Haddad is the story of the Shapiro family and the hotel, the incursions being attempted by the mob (including a historical figure or two), and how the personal lives of the sons begin to enter into the entire family and hotel dynamic. It’s a fascinating story told well. (It is also a story that includes rough language and a number of scenes of violence.)

 

 Haddad, a native of Hollywood and Los Angeles, has had an extensive career in television and film. He first published book was nonfiction, High Fives, Pennant Drives, and Fernandomania: A Fan’s History of the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Glory Years, 1977-1981 (2012). He’s also published the novels Skinny White Freak and Aramid, and the nonfiction book 10,000 Steps A Day in L.A.: 52 Walking Adventures. He lives in Los Angeles.

 

Paradise Palms takes the reader in unexpected direction but always remains faithful to the core story of a family and the lengths it’s prepared to go to protect itself.