RICHARD LANGE

A Novel
L I T T L E , BROWN AND COMPANY
NE W YORK BOSTON L ONDON
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RICHARD LANGE
A Novel by
Readi ng Group Gui de
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A conversation between Richard
Lange and George Pelecanos
Its a rare pleasure to be a fy on the wall during a conversation
between Richard Lange and George Pelecanos, two crime fc-
tion masters. Below is our transcript of their exchange, which
ranges widely and rivetingly across such subjects as empathy,
prisons, the writing process, and why vets make ideal detectives.
Richard Lange: First of, let me say that Im a huge fan of
your work from way back, and its a real honor to engage in
this kind of dialogue with one of my heroes. I especially want to
thank you for all you did to spread the word about Dead Boys,
my frst book. I cant tell you how many people have told me
that they read it because you mentioned it somewhere or rec-
ommended it to them. Im forever in your debt for that.
Now, to the questions. Ive tried to keep them brief and per-
tinent but havent always succeeded.
The Double is the second book featuring Spero Lucas. Why
did you choose to start another series, and what are the major
diferences between this one and your earlier series? Were you
looking to explore new kinds of stories and characters in this
one?
George Pelecanos: I never plan on a series. When I fnished
writing The Cut I felt like there was more to explore with the
character of Spero Lucas, so I went after it. Some of the things
I only hinted at in the frst book come to the forefront in The
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READING GROUP GUIDE 3
Double. Lucass war experience in the Middle East has impacted
him deeply, and the darker aspects of his psyche have bubbled
up to the surface. Its a harder, more violent, and more sexually
explicit book than The Cut. Also, I liked writing about a young,
physical guy who has a young mans appetites. Id been writing
about middle-aged guys for a while, and switching up helped
me cut loose. The Lucas books have a certain kind of drive and
energy.
Richard, you made a positive reputation early on with your
short-story collection, Dead Boys, which you know I enjoyed a
great deal. When I read chapter 6 of your new novel, Angel Baby,
I was struck by how complete and polished it was. Detailing the
prison life of Jernimo Cruz, it stands on its own. Is it accurate to
say that you craft each chapter in one of your novels with the care
and precision that you would in one of your short stories? And
which form of fction do you prefer, as both a reader and a writer?
Lange: Maybe because I started as a short-story writer, the in-
dividual chapters of the novels sometimes have a self-contained
feel to them. Theyre almost slices of the characters lives. Its at
odds with the narrative demands of the plot, I suppose, but its
the way I tell my stories, through discrete scenes. Im a slow,
careful writer, even in frst drafts, and I spend a lot of time chip-
ping away at things in order to get them to my liking. As you
know, what looks simplest is often most difcult to achieve.
As far as what I prefer, short stories or novels, as a reader, I
love both equally. When it comes to my own work, stories are
where I feel most comfortable, but Im learning to love the ex-
pansiveness of writing novels which is good, because you cant
make a living writing short stories.
Youve done a lot of TV work. How has that infuenced your
fction, if at all? Its a diferent kind of storytelling, isnt it?
A CONVERSATION BETWEEN RICHARD LANGE AND
GEORGE PELECANOS
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4 READING GROUP GUIDE
Pelecanos: Working with writers like David Simon, Richard
Price, Ed Burns, Eric Overmyer, Bill Zorzi, and many others
in TV has made me a better novelist. Just sitting around a table
with those guys and talking about the process was invaluable. It
was my graduate school. Screenwriting is a diferent kind of sto-
rytelling in terms of format. But its still about the characters and
voices.
Love the scene on page 165 of Angel Baby, where Thacker
shakes down a couple of young women in a Mustang con-
vertible. Thackers somewhat of a pig, and yet this reader felt
empathetic toward him to a degree. Its hard to describe anyone
as good or bad in your novel, which makes the characters
closer to human than type. You seem to take great, deliberate
care in shading your people, is that right?
Lange: Yeah, the black/white, good/evil thing doesnt work
for me in life, so Im not going to do it in my fction. Im all
over the map inside my head, and I assume that everyone else
is, too, whether theyre aware of it or willing to admit it or not.
I try to create real people, and then put them through their
paces. Of course, theyre not real, theyre fctional beings, but I
want them to have all the ambiguity of real people. You may not
like them, but I hope you understand their motivations and the
forces that shaped them and cause them to do what they do. Im
trying to create empathy. We can use more empathy.
Spero Lucas and a lot of his friends and associates are veterans,
primarily of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Was there a reason
you chose to have so many characters be ex-military?
Pelecanos: I live near the old Walter Reed Army Medical
Center, and Ive had the opportunity to talk to some of the
returning soldiers and marines whove been wounded. At the
A CONVERSATION BETWEEN RICHARD LANGE AND
GEORGE PELECANOS
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READING GROUP GUIDE 5
same time I found that criminal defense attorneys and prose-
cutors often use veterans as private detectives to harvest infor-
mation before going to trial. Vets are suited for the work, and
the job closely replicates the experience theyve had overseas.
Meaning, in active duty, they wake up every day and are given a
mission. It was an organic way to tell my story. Everyone knows
whats going on with our veterans and how weve fallen woe-
fully short in our obligation to them. Fiction can take it right to
the heart.
Lange: I enjoy books set in real cities, and I feel like I could
use The Double and many of your other novels as road maps and
guides to certain sections of D.C. You obviously know the city
inside and out, but do you actually visit the locales you write
about in order to get them right? I only ask because I do a lot
of boots-on-the-ground research for my stuf. For example, part
of Angel Baby takes place in Compton, an area of L.A. Id never
actually been to, so I drove down and hung out for a couple of
days to get enough sensory details about the place to feel conf-
dent writing about it. Do you make similar feld trips?
Pelecanos: Always. I do a lot of street research before I sit
down to write. I researched both Spero Lucas novels from the
seat of my 2001 Jeep Cherokee, the saddle of my road bike, and
the cockpit of my kayak. I enjoy that part of the process. I dont
start to see the book until I get out there.
On page 103 of Angel Baby, a description of a neighborhood
in Tijuana:
Its as bad as prisonworse, because out here they tell you
youre free. Dusty boys with no future kick scufed soccer
balls, a widow in perpetual mourning sells tacos from a grill
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GEORGE PELECANOS
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6 READING GROUP GUIDE
in front of her house, and gangsters congregate in the shad-
ows with caguamas of Tecate, dreaming of international hit
man stardom.
Thats great writing, man. How much of that sort of thing
comes from your imagination, and how much is straight obser-
vance and reporting?
Lange: Its a combination. In the case of TJ in Angel Baby, Ive
spent a lot of time there and in other cities and towns in Mex-
ico, so I have a feeling for the place and lots of sense memories
to draw on when writing about it. Of course, its not straight
reportage, because Im shading things to ft whatever story Im
writing. When it comes to writing about someplace like La
Mesa, the prison in Angel Baby, I do research online. Its a real
prison, so I was able to fnd videos and photos that gave me an
idea of what it looks like inside, what the prisoners wear, etc.
I used these details to ground me, and then I made up the rest
based on prison movies Ive seen and real prisons Ive visited in
the course of my travels. Im kind of a prison freak, actually.
Spero does a lot of biking and kayaking in The Double and The
Cut, so much that it wore me out just reading about it. Are these
activities you enjoy? If so, how do you ever fnd the time? Do
you stick to a pretty strict schedule in your daily life?
Pelecanos: As you know, you cant write all day long. I do a
long morning session at my desk, then get out in the afternoon
and do something physical to blow it out of my head and clean
house. Then I come home and rewrite at night. I write seven
days a week when Im working on a book. Its a strict schedule,
but thats how I get it done.
Can you tell the readers your road (and roadblocks) to getting
A CONVERSATION BETWEEN RICHARD LANGE AND
GEORGE PELECANOS
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READING GROUP GUIDE 7
published? I think its something that potential writers like to
hear, and all of our stories are diferent.
Lange: I got a scholarship to flm school at USC and took
fction-writing classes there with T. C. Boyle. I didnt go to grad
school because I was sick of being poor and wanted to get a real
job. I ended up in magazine publishing, and that was my career
for twenty years. During that time I wrote fction as a hobby. I
wrote short stories exclusively, sent them out to journals, and got
rejected over and over and over. Each time they came back, Id
rework them and send them out again. Through this process, I
taught myself the grind of writing. My frst story was published
when I was thirty-fve years old. Over the course of the next
eight years I published a bunch more, all of which are collected
in Dead Boys. An agent contacted me. That led to a two-book
deal for the stories and the novel This Wicked World.
It was a long, lonely haul. I didnt do writers groups or re-
treats or classes. Im too shy for that kind of thing and wouldnt
have trusted the opinions of anybody else anyway. I knew what
good writing was, and I knew when I was doing it. I didnt sit
around waiting for inspiration. I wrote a little bit every day, good
or bad. Writing was and is as much a part of my life as eating
and sleeping, and its the only thing I let myself be proud about.
Pelecanos: One of the endorsement quotes on the back of
Angel Baby includes the line Lange stands out as the greatest
young crime writer of his generation, precisely because he
doesnt write crimehe writes literature. Are the two concepts
mutually exclusive?
Lange: Those are just marketing terms to me. Im writing ex-
actly what I want to write, and they can call it whatever they
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GEORGE PELECANOS
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8 READING GROUP GUIDE
want in order to sell it. People have said Im too literary for
the crime crowd and too crime-y for the literary crowd. Every-
bodys taste is diferent, and Im not going to chase an audience.
I like what I write, and thats all that matters. Ill probably have
a short, shitty career because of that attitude, but itll damn sure
be fun while it lasts.
This conversation frst appeared on mulhollandbooks.com on July 15. 2013.
Used with permission.
A CONVERSATION BETWEEN RICHARD LANGE AND
GEORGE PELECANOS
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Questions and topics for
discussion
1. What was your initial impression of Luz? Did your opinion
change over the course of the novel? Did you feel her
choices especially leaving her daughter behind and return-
ing to Tijuanawere justifable at the time? Why or why
not?
2. Based on the descriptions in the novel, do you think the
methods of the U.S. Border Patrol are efective? Is their mis-
sion worthwhile, or is it pointless to try to hold back the
ocean (16)? Why do people take such enormous risks to try
to cross the border illegally?
3. How did Luzs relationship with her mother infuence the
direction her life took? Is there any love left between them?
How might their history infuence Luzs plans for raising
Isabel?
4. Luzs mother told her, Assume that everyone you meet is
a liar, a cheat, a rapist, and a murderer. . . . And if anyone
claims not to be, trust him even less than those who have
their crimes tattooed across their foreheads (30). Given the
events in the book, was this good advice? Why or why not?
5. What do you think of Malones way of life when he frst
meets Luz? Do the events in his past make it more un-
derstandable? Did his actions over the course of the novel
change your feelings about him? If so, how?
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10 READING GROUP GUIDE
6. What are the rules of honor in Rolandos world? Is it strange
that he respects a man like Jernimo, who defes him (64),
but has contempt for the cops who cooperate with him (46)?
Does Rolando himself abide by this code?
7. Is Luzs beauty an asset or a liability? How does it infuence
the way others respond to her? How might her story have
been diferent if she hadnt been so beautiful?
8. Why does Rolando consider Luz his greatest enemy (52)?
Can a betrayal turn love to hate so quickly? Why or why not?
9. Do you believe Jernimo when he tells Irma, Theres some-
thing good in me (63)? Do you think he can really walk away
frombeing another mans monster after so many years (219)?
What about the other fawed characters in the book? Is there
good in each of them, or are some beyond redemption?
10. Why was Thacker so transfxed by Brother Clyde Waters
(16770)? Why does he ultimately become disillusioned?
What does this story reveal about his character?
11. How does the L.A. depicted in this novel difer from Luzs
fantasy of the city that had been shaped by MTV and gossip
magazines (187)? How does each of the main characters
paths difer from the life they envisioned for themselves?
12. Throughout the book, characters make difcult decisions.
What do you think of Jernimos choice to go through with
Rolandos mission (85), or Carmens choice when Jernimo
and Thacker come to her house (191)? Are these real choices
at all, or are the characters paths already determined at these
moments?
13. How did you feel about Carmens reaction to Luzs return
(2013)? Does Luz deserve the harshwords Carmenhas for her?
14. What do you think the future holds for Luz? What does it
hold for Jernimo? Do they and the other characters in the
book get what they deserve?
QUESTIONS AND TOPICS FOR DISCUSSION
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