The Garden on Sunset by Martin Turnbull

Not everyone liked The Garden on Sunset; in fact, a couple of us really hated it.  Everyone else liked it well enough, especially because it was such an easy read.  Our hostess had the fabulous idea to email the author, Martin Turnbull – and he replied!!  They had quite the email chit-chat going on, and Mr. Turnbull even provided us with some discussion questions.  How cool!  We thought that this book was going to be the first in a trilogy, but apparently he’s going to write NINE of these suckers.

Some highlights:

• Not much character development; sometimes hard to keep them straight
• Characters predictable; scenarios a little ridiculous
• Prohibition lasted 13 years
• Rabbit Test was early pregnancy test; in fact, ALL the rabbits died!
• Cosmopolitan Pictures later became Cosmopolitan the magazine
• There were so many small events, but no one big plot – read like a blog
• It was hard to relate to others what it was actually about
• The time jumps were extremely annoying
• The end of each chapter resolved the issue at hand, instead of building suspense
• SO much name-dropping, although is that how it really was in Hollywood at that time?
• Did Turnbull just write this to live out his own fantasy?
• Every extraneous character was famous, like in an old Bugs Bunny cartoon!
• Garden of Allah Hotel similar to the Chelsea in Patti Smith’s book?