Review: WONDER VALLEY

WONDER VALLEY by Ivy Pochoda (Indigo Press, 2018)

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

When a teenager runs away from his father’s mysterious commune, he sets in motion a domino effect that connects a cast of six characters who narrate Wonder Valley.

There’s Ren, just out of juvie, who travels to L.A. in search of his mother. There’s Owen and James, teenage twins who live in a desert commune where their father, a self-proclaimed healer, holds a powerful sway over his disciples. There’s Britt, who shows up at the commune harbouring a dark secret. There’s Tony, a bored and unhappy lawyer. And there’s Blake, a drifter hiding in the desert, doing his best to fight off his most violent impulses. 

Their lives will all intertwine and come crashing together in a shocking way, one that could only happen in this enchanting, dangerous city.

One of the cool things about interacting with so many fellow crime-lovers (authors, readers, publishers, bloggers) regularly throughout each year is that no matter how many hundreds of authors I've read and enjoyed over recent years, I often get some really great recommendations for new-to-me authors, including 'hidden gems' which aficionados love but haven't yet broken through to a broader casual crime readership. A couple of years ago I started hearing a lot of great things (including from the likes of the great Michael Connelly when I interviewed him about his then-latest novel and the Bosch television series), about New Yorker turned Angeleno author Ivy Pochoda.

So I went into WONDER VALLEY with a mixture of curiosity and high expectations. 

My verdict? It's a gritty, bruising literary crime tale that deeply explores its characters and their place in society, building slowly from disparate threads into an intense, nuanced story. 

An atypical crime tale, but a very good one. 

Pochoda lures readers in with an unusual beginning, as commuters caught in the choking traffic of Los Angeles witness a sight that's bizarre even for California: a completely naked young man running down the freeway, eluding police while catching the attention of news helicopters and plenty of smartphones.

From there we soak into a fragmented narrative, split across character perspectives and time periods in the years leading up to the freeway incident. The commonality is that most are living on the fringes or on the edge in some way. Plans waylaid, hardscrabble existence, or lives upturned for various reasons. 

Like Connelly, Pochoda takes readers into the grit and tough realities that lie beneath the glamorous So-Cal veneer that's packaged and presented to global audiences. From Ren, who took a life at 12 and finds further heartbreak while looking for his mother on skid row, to Britt, the college sports star looking for a new life on a commune, "a new person on top of the one she’d been trying to escape" - Pochoda showcases lives and characters who tear at your heart and soul. 

WONDER VALLEY is an unusual, slow-burn type of thriller that builds through its deep characters and excellent prose more than storyline twists, remaining compelling throughout before the threads begin to knit together in ways that feel organic rather than forced. A smudged mirror held up to California life. 

A powerful piece of writing from a talented storyteller. 

Craig Sisterson is a lawyer turned features writer from New Zealand, now living in London. In recent years he’s interviewed hundreds of crime writers and talked about the genre on national radio, top podcasts, and onstage at books festivals on three continents. He has been a judge of the Ned Kelly Awards and the McIlvanney Prize, and is founder of the Ngaio Marsh Awards and co-founder of Rotorua Noir. His first non-fiction book, SOUTHERN CROSS CRIME, was published in 2020. You can heckle him on Twitter.