*Spoiler heavy thoughts on Malibu Rising. I highly recommend reading it first before diving into this review.*
The first time I met Mick Riva was in the pages of Taylor Jenkins Reid's novel, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo. He was described as a handsome singer with a charisma that could match Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin. After that book, Mick Riva made a small cameo again in the author's next novel, Daisy Jones and The Six. So, when Taylor Jenkins Reid announced that her newest novel, Malibu Rising, would follow Mick Riva's children I knew I had to read it. It was one of my most anticipated books this year and while I knew beforehand that I was going to like it, what I did not expect was how much I was going to love it.
The year is 1983. Every summer on the last Saturday in August the biggest party of the year took place in Malibu at the home of surfer and supermodel, Nina Riva. Anyone who is anyone was there. If you knew the address, you were invited. What happened at the parties were always the stuff of legends just as famous as the people who attended let alone the famous Rivas who hosted it.
To the world, Nina Riva was seen as the gorgeous daughter of singer and icon, Mick Riva, and the eldest sibling of Jay, a championship surfer, Hud, a photographer, and young Kit, a firecracker all on her own and as talented of a surfer as her siblings. Among the Rivas however, Nina was the family matriarch carrying the weight of everything her parents left her with. She was a far cry from the glamour and beauty her name and career presented her as. Although tonight she is supposed to play hostess at her own party, she would much rather be on her surfboard than deal with the gossip surrounding her break-up from her tennis pro husband. The same can be said for Hud, who knows that tonight he must face his brother with a secret he has been carrying. For Jay and Kit however, this party may be just what they need. While Jay is hoping to see the girl he cannot stop thinking about, Kit is trying to find her identity and this party may help her do just that.
By midnight, the party will descend into chaos, with a few surprise guests caught in the crossfire, and before the break of dawn the house will be engulfed in flames. The hours in between, however, is what the Rivas will always remember of that night in Malibu.
I was already a fan of The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and Daisy Jones and The Six, but with Malibu Rising, Taylor Jenkins Reid brought in everything great from those two books and went even further in telling this story about a family and the relationship between parents and their children. I was immediately hooked in by Nina, Jay, Hud, and Kit alone, but their family backstory, including their parents' union, all leading up to the party was more than what I wanted yet still devoured. It was unexpected the depths this book went that I found myself taking notes and going back by listening to it on audiobook just to try and catch or analyze things I missed or was foreshadowed.
When you think about Taylor Jenkins Reid's two previous books, there are two sides to a story that all culminate into one larger picture. There is one story the public in that fictional world knows, but there is also another story that is actually the truth behind everything. Only the readers get to see and understand the full scope of it all.
In The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Evelyn Hugo is remembered, apart from her film career, as the movie star who married multiple times. As readers get to know her, we learn that there is more to her and those marriages than Hollywood scandal. The same can be seen in Daisy Jones and The Six. They were remembered as a rock band with a stellar debut album, but then immediately disbanded with only rumors and assumptions as to what lead to their breakup. Taylor Jenkins Reid again tells us, through oral history this time, that there was more to it than just a simple disagreement. Both these books and their characters are entirely fictional, if not inspired by some real-life figures. However, Taylor Jenkins Reid has a way of bringing them to life that you believe that they are real because their stories feel honest as is the truth behind their life the public does not know about.
This happens again in Malibu Rising. The biggest difference is that instead of everything being revealed to us and the fictional public through a tell-all interview like in Evelyn Hugo or a VH1-like documentary like in Daisy Jones, Malibu Rising tells us - and only us readers - through a third person narrative the Rivas's real story. We are taken to the present of 1983 with flashbacks to the past and how the weight of those events have still been carried over into the present through Nina, Jay, Hud and Kit. And what better way to do this than through an end-of-summer party where anything can happen, and everything can be revealed about a person's true nature.
At the back of the book, I was reading the Acknowledgments by the author and the last paragraph stuck out to me, which was dedicated to her daughter. In it she talks about being a parent and how imperfect she is but how she will always be there for her. This is what Malibu Rising is ultimately about - parents and their children. This relationship is littered throughout the book and more so on who your parents are, their hopes, dreams, and heartbreaks, and how they are passed down and carried on by their children.
What I immediately thought Taylor Jenkins Reid did so well in telling this story was by splitting the book into two parts. Now, I know some readers I had mixed feelings about this with some enjoying Part One more than Part Two, but for me I thought both Parts were needed to see the cause and effect of the past and the present and what it means before the night is over. Part One is set in the early hours leading up to the party alongside the Rivas's backstory from 1956 to 1981. Part Two is set in the hours of the party and how everything we now know comes together alongside various events happening at the party with the guests. It was interesting learning about Mick Riva and his relationship with his wife, June Costas, but it also broke my heart seeing what became of that marriage and their family especially how it affected their children.
There is much to said about Jay, Hud, and Kit, but the standout character for me was Nina. She is more than just a beautiful model. In her heart she is a surfer and like the waves and currents, she has gone through such a tumultuous life with so much pain and broken promises that she has not had the time to really grasp and cope with everything. In many ways she is both like her mother and father. I tend to quote or reference Mad Men a lot (hey, it's a really good show), but Nina and Mick's relationship at times reminded me of Don Draper and his daughter, Sally. There is a scene from season 7 in the episode titled "The Forecast" when Sally expresses her annoyance over her parents' behavior and wishes to be different than them, Don tells Sally that she is like him and her mother and that it is up to her to be more than that. That instantly made me think of Nina and her siblings and how it is up to them to be more than their parents. There is also this beautiful moment in the book that resonated with me where Nina imagines a metaphorical box from her mother:
Nina suddenly had a picture in her head. It was if June had given her a box - as if every parent gives their children a box - full of the things they carried.June had given her children this box packed to the brim with her own experiences, her own treasures and heartbreaks. Her own guilts and pleasures, triumphs and losses, values and biases, duties, and sorrows.And Nina had been carrying around this box her whole life, feeling the full weight of it.But it was not, Nina saw just then, her job to carry the full box. Her job was to sort through the box. To decide what to keep, and to put the rest down. She had to choose what, of the things she inherited from the people who came before her, she wanted to bring forward. And what, of the past, she wanted to leave behind. (357)
Nina had been carrying so much of what her parents left her with that she inevitably also had to sacrifice so much of herself believing that she had to hold on to everything befallen on her. She had to let go of her education to help her siblings and give them a chance to finish school. She had to sacrifice her body in the form of modeling in order to gain income. That realization that she did not have to carry this box left to her by parents holds more weight than what she thought she had to carry. It also gives her all the closure she needs to finally let go and do something for herself by the end of the book.
As much as this story is about parents and children, the heart of it all is the tight knit relationship between Nina, Jay, Hud, and Kit. I loved the dynamics of their relationship and how their common activity was surfing. Surfing is something they can catch and control, which is telling of themselves and their lives. Jay and Hud's close bond since birth is felt throughout the book, that you understand how each of their secrets will affect them as brothers and the trust they had always shared. Then there is Nina and Kit. The eldest and the youngest. Two sisters. Two young women. Their relationship was relatable and you can see how they are much alike and different. You have Nina who is beautiful and talented, and you have Kit who is like that too but just does not know it yet. Nina is very much the older sister to Kit in that she looks after and dotes on her more than Jay and Hud, but this is probably because she is trying to emulate her mother or how her parents should have been when she was growing up. I think Kit sees this and even though this bothered her growing up, she also understands and appreciates it. It is also fitting that she takes in everything Nina taught her in the end when she must become an elder sister to someone she never met until now. Their relationship was probably my favorite to read, especially before and after the party. What these four Rivas go through and who they become from it is a testament to their bond as siblings.
The actual party that plays out in Part Two is utter insanity, but full of hidden meanings and layers. It can be interpreted to mean several different things, but for me I thought the party represented Mick Riva.
Because, just as it is in Malibu's nature to burn, so was it in one particular person's nature to set fire and walk away. (5)
At first, I thought the party and the fire that burnt down the Riva mansion represented the Riva siblings until I re-read that last line in the opening of the book. Mick Riva is the one who burns down the house unintentionally, just like how he walked away from his family. In fact, if you reexamine Part One and Part Two, you will notice events in Mick and June's marriage reappear again in their own form at the party. For example, Mick begging June to take him back after he leaves her for another woman is similar to Nina's husband, Brandon Randall, pleading with her at the party to take him back after he left her for a fellow tennis player, Carrie Soto. The arrival of Casey Greens and how kindly she is treated by Nina could also be compared to Hud's origins and Mick's careless infidelities.
The chaos that ensues can be interpreted as how Mick's arrival in June's life and his departure from their family disrupted everything. All the guests who behave badly without any care or courtesy to the house and the Rivas is a reflection of Mick. He treated June poorly after she welcomed him into her life by cheating on her repeatedly despite how much he loved her much like the guests who came to the party because they "love" the Rivas and yet destroyed and vandalized their home without much thought. Mick walked away from his children, and when he arrives at the party hoping to be welcomed by them, he fails to realize what he has done and how it has affected them just like the guests who come for the party and leave not caring about what they did.
Speaking of which, the climax of the book when Mick and all his children finally talk to each other was my favorite moment. It happens away from the party on the private beach, away from the madness happening inside the house, and was heavy and loaded with so much tension and pent up feelings that all the characters come undone. It was messy and emotional with everyone pouring their heart out and it was something I had been anxiously waiting for that I felt perfectly gave some closure to their relationship. Whether anything will really change between the siblings and their father after that meeting I think is left open-ended on some levels. My hope is that Mick remained in contact with his children, but like how he set fire and casually walked away it could be unlikely.
I think the fire that burns down the house is not what is important, but what came out of it. Nina was able to escape a career and fame she never asked for and finally find herself again. Kit, who now knows who she is, is able to move forward and become whoever she wants to be. You can also tell too that her bond with Nina - that relationship between an older and younger sister - will influence her new relationship with Casey Greens. Jay and Hud's relationship grows as well with both still by each other's side but also on their own separate paths. Maybe this is too metaphorical, but the Rivas are like phoenixes at the end of the book, finally rising from the ashes of the fire their father had set.
There are so many things I could say and go on about and so many things I could analyze and try to interpret, but most of all this book will stay with me. I enjoyed it as much as I loved it. Taylor Jenkins Reid went above and beyond from what she started in The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and Daisy Jones and The Six, by going deeper and telling something heartfelt, profound, and maybe even personal. With Malibu Rising, where you come from and where you are headed may shape you, but ultimately it is your choice on who want to be and what you will take with you.
****
The Malibu Rising Playlist
The 1980's is alive in well in the pages of Malibu Rising, and in the playlist composed by Random House and Taylor Jenkins Reid. The first playlist features music that encapsulates the era and Nina, Jay, Hud, and Kit's personalities and tastes in music. The second playlist reflects Mick Riva and his music style. You can also listen to each characters's individual playlist curated by Random House on Spotify.
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