O'Hara's Choice

 

O’Hara’s Choice – Leon Uris

I’ve learned a few hard lessons over the years while reading so many books. Here’s one: You know how when you buy a book, there’s a blurb of praise from another well-known author on the front cover?  Something like: “A magnificent spell-binding tale!” – Stephen King.  Well, 95% of the time, the author “giving” the praise never even read the book.  This is simply a publisher’s trick to make you buy the thing.  You wouldn’t think well-known authors would prostitute themselves stooping this low, but I guess business is business.  Another hard lesson: Many books written by an author weren’t really written by that author. Read that last sentence again. I found it fishy that one of my favorite authors, Clive Cussler, used to generate one book every year or so, and then all of the sudden he seemed to be writing 4 or 5 per year.  Each of these multiple releases had a co-author, of course, and apparently Cussler had very little to do with these books; they were all basically written by the co-author.  What Mr. Cussler actually did in terms of development of the story, I have no idea.  Again, it’s a business.

Well, I’m bringing this up because, in the case of O’Hara’s Choice, the author (Leon Uris) had already died before the book was released. Many times, publishers will go through the corpse’s writing desk (metaphorically of course) looking for anything the late author may have started.  Another author, or group of authors, is called in to formulate a finished product.  Michael Crichton is guilty of this.  Well, I mean HE’S not guilty; he’s DEAD, but you know what I mean.

Leon Uris was a great writer of historical fiction way back when. My guess is many current readers have never heard of him, but back in the 1960s and 1970s, his gripping tales that took place in areas such as Berlin, Dublin, Warsaw, and the newly formed State of Israel were incredibly rewarding works of literature.  This book doesn’t belong with his classics. It doesn’t come close.  It’s embarrassingly bad.

It starts off with an interesting premise. It’s a few years after the conclusion of the U.S. Civil War and we meet a group of soldiers who are referred to as “marines”.  We’re introduced to about 4 or 5 of these veterans, we learn of their upbringing, their participation in the awful war, and of their current situation.  They’re proud of who they are, but most people are unfamiliar with the monicker “marine” and everyone wonders if this eccentric group will ever move forward or be relevant in the current United States military.

Sounds like an o.k. premise, but things spiral down in a big way.  My guess is this as far as Leon Uris got before he passed away.  So what do publishers do with this interesting premise?  Nothing much.  They should have left well alone.  I’m not sure why I even bother discussing it, but one of the Marines – O’Hara – has a son named Zach who is coming into adulthood.  Zach falls for a young rich sassy belle named Amanda.  Amanda has gobs of money.  Her parents, of course, don’t want her associating with someone beneath the family such as a marine, so we have yet another tepid tale of unrequited love.

You can probably guess the drill (pardon the pun) at this point.  The lovers must stay away from each other. They date (and are even pledged to marry) others, they purposely avoid each other – Zach even requests military duty that will take him far way – but you just can’t escape love.  The story isn’t terribly original nor interesting.

There’s an attempt at a subplot with Amanda’s father, who is very rich, trying to wheel and deal with the leaders of the government that would actually help the future of the marines. This makes things more complicated since his daughter is in love with one of them.  Yes, her father admires the marines; as long as they keep their grubby hands off his daughter.  Again, though, this never really goes anywhere.

This was a painfully stupid story. It might have worked had Uris actually done the writing, and even then, I imagine he would have taken the story in a different direction and not made this thing so unbearably sappy.  This was an injustice to the legend of Leon Uris.   On a happier note, he’s written some great books that have been forgotten by many.  I would recommend titles such as Exodus, Trinity, Mila 18, Battle Cry, and The Haj.   Those were great.  This one was not.  Rest in Peace Mr. Uris.  I’m sorry something like this was done to you.