Hollywood Park
Author: Mikel Jollett
To Be Published: May 26, 2020
384 Pages

Reviewed By: Jessica
Jessica’s Rating: 4 stars
Dates Read: April 11-26, 2020

Book Description:

On July 15, NPR Music’s Bob Boilen was joined by writer and musician Mikel Jollett, author of Hollywood Park, to discuss his New York Times bestselling memoir. Hollywood Park beautifully, painfully details the author’s journey from a troubled childhood – poverty, emotional abuse, addiction and an escape from the notorious Synanon cult – to the discovery of his voice as a writer and musician. Hollywood Park is a memoir by Mikel Jollett, front man of the band Airborne Toxic Event. Jollet was born into the Church of Synanon, one of America’s most infamous cults, and subjected to a childhood filled with poverty, addiction, and emotional abuse. 'Hollywood Park is amazing. Mikel Jollett takes the shards of a broken childhood - imagine a life where escaping from a violent cult is somehow not a path to safety - and makes it a universal story of the struggle to find connection in a brutally beautiful world. His story zigs where you think it's going to zag, and even the most irredeemable.

Hollywood Park is a remarkable memoir of a tumultuous life. Mikel Jollett was born into one of the country’s most infamous cults, and subjected to a childhood filled with poverty, addiction, and emotional abuse. Yet, ultimately, his is a story of fierce love and family loyalty told in a raw, poetic voice that signals the emergence of a uniquely gifted writer.

On July 15, NPR Music’s Bob Boilen was joined by writer and musician Mikel Jollett, author of Hollywood Park, to discuss his New York Times bestselling memoir. Hollywood Park (2018–present) In September 2019, it was announced that Anna Bulbrook would be leaving the band, and that the band had been working on a new project. 32 On November 12, 2019, frontman Mikel Jollett announced via Twitter that the band would be releasing their sixth studio album, Hollywood Park, on May 8, 2020, 33 through.

We were never young. We were just too afraid of ourselves. No one told us who we were or what we were or where all our parents went. They would arrive like ghosts, visiting us for a morning, an afternoon. They would sit with us or walk around the grounds, to laugh or cry or toss us in the air while we screamed. Then they’d disappear again, for weeks, for months, for years, leaving us alone with our memories and dreams, our questions and confusion. …

So begins Hollywood Park, Mikel Jollett’s remarkable memoir. His story opens in an experimental commune in California, which later morphed into the Church of Synanon, one of the country’s most infamous and dangerous cults. Per the leader’s mandate, all children, including Jollett and his older brother, were separated from their parents when they were six months old, and handed over to the cult’s “School.” After spending years in what was essentially an orphanage, Mikel escaped the cult one morning with his mother and older brother. But in many ways, life outside Synanon was even harder and more erratic.

In his raw, poetic and powerful voice, Jollett portrays a childhood filled with abject poverty, trauma, emotional abuse, delinquency and the lure of drugs and alcohol. Raised by a clinically depressed mother, tormented by his angry older brother, subjected to the unpredictability of troubled step-fathers and longing for contact with his father, a former heroin addict and ex-con, Jollett slowly, often painfully, builds a life that leads him to Stanford University and, eventually, to finding his voice as a writer and musician.

Hollywood Park is told at first through the limited perspective of a child, and then broadens as Jollett begins to understand the world around him. Although Mikel Jollett’s story is filled with heartbreak, it is ultimately an unforgettable portrayal of love at its fiercest and most loyal.

Jessica’s Review:

I had not heard of Mikel Jollett before receiving my arc copy of Hollywood Park, but his is a story where you do not have to be familiar with the person to see how much they overcome. Mikel started life in the cult of Synanon and was taken away from his parents at 6 months of age, as all children of the cult were. Several years later, his mother gets away from the cult with Mikel and his older brother but they still experience a very hard life.

Jollett writes his memoir in a unique way: He starts off the novel at five years old and ‘talks’ as that age with everything that is going on around him. As he becomes older and understands more, so does his telling of his story, in the age he is at that time. Even as a small child, he was wiser than his actual age. Not many would be able to tell their story in this way with success. This memoir shows the addiction that occurs and the devastating effects of it on the addict and also the effects on the addict’s loved ones. There is also loss that occurs and we can really feel the emotions that Jollett expresses. He is a musical artist after all, so those words come well to him.

Memoirs are always hard to review, as it is someone’s life and their experiences/ interpretation of events, but this one reaches a cord with the reader. We all have different life experiences and those experiences shape who we become as a person. Jollet sharing his story with the reader through writing or through his lyrics of the songs his band performs can help others with their experiences and interpretations.

Jollett’s band The Airborne Toxic Event has a new cd coming out on May 22^nd. It is also titled Hollywood Park, just as this memoir. It is the band’s first album in three years.

Many thanks to the publisher, Celadon Books for sending me an arc copy to read and review.

Hollywood Park By Mikel Jollett And Brother

Pre-order Links:

Hollywood Park By Mikel Jollett

Hollywood Park Goodreads

Memoir:
Amazon US
Amazon UK

The Airborne Toxic Event music:
Amazon US
Amazon UK

Mikel Frans Jollett (born May 21, 1974)^[1] is an American musician and author. He is best known as the frontman for American indie rock band the Airborne Toxic Event as well as the author of the New York Times bestselling memoir Hollywood Park (2020).^[2]

Early life[edit]

Jollett was born in Santa Monica in the experimental commune society called Synanon.^[3] Until he was five, he and his older brother were raised apart from their parents in Synanon schools.^[4][5] Jollett's father had been incarcerated in Chino State Prison from 1963-1966^[6] prior to joining Synanon where he overcame a heroin addiction. Jollett's mother was a social worker with a master's degree from the University of California, Berkeley, who met Jollett's father in Synanon. When the commune became violent, his mother took him and his brother to live in Oakland and then in Oregon.^[4]

Jollett eventually moved to live with his father and step mother in Los Angeles, where he attended Westchester High School,^[7] graduating with a 4.3 GPA. During high school, Jollett participated in California YMCA Youth & Government's Model Legislature & Court program and served as the Speaker of the Assembly in 1992. ^[8][9] He later attended Stanford University, graduating with honors in 1996.^[10] While at Stanford, Jollett was a member of Claude Steele's lab group in which he conducted research on the concept of stereotype threat.^[11] Jollett's work focused on how negative racial stereotypes negatively affected the identity and test performance of high school students.

Writing[edit]

In the summer of 2008, McSweeney's issue 27 published Jollett's short story, 'The Crack', which appeared between short stories by Liz Mandrell and Stephen King.^[12] He was a frequent contributor to All Things Considered on NPR,^[13] the Los Angeles Times, an editor at large for Men's Health and the managing editor of Filter magazine.^[14] Jollett was accepted to Yaddo Writer's Colony in 2005 to complete his novel based on 'The Crack', but did not attend, choosing to pursue music instead.^[4]

Jollett's memoir Hollywood Park was published on May 26, 2020.^[4][5][15] It debuted its first week at #8 on The New York Times Best Seller list.^[16]

Music career[edit]

Jollett began seriously writing songs following a week in March 2006, during which he underwent a break-up and learned his mother had been diagnosed with cancer. This quick succession of events spurred a period of intense songwriting featured on the band's first album.

Hollywood Park: A Memoir By Mikel Jollett:

In keeping with his literary background, Jollett named the band after a section of Don DeLillo's postmodern novel White Noise,^[4] which won the National Book Award in 1985. In the book, a chemical spill from a railcar releases a poisonous cloud, dubbed by the military and media as an 'airborne toxic event.' Jollett chose to name the band after the event in the novel which triggers the fear of death that fundamentally alters the protagonist's outlook on himself, his family, and his life. The band was born of a similar life-altering sequence of events, and thus, the themes of mortality and media consumption that arise from the novel's toxic cloud serve as a major impetus for Jollett's creative drive.The Airborne Toxic Event's debut album received favorable reviews from such outlets as the Los Angeles Times, Newsweek, Q, and Entertainment Weekly. Notably, the Boston Herald named the band's album 'The Debut Album of the Year.'^[17] In addition, iTunes named 'Sometime Around Midnight' the No. 1 Alternative Song of the Year on their Best of list.^[18] The song went on to become a certified gold single.^[19] The band has been signed to Island Records and Epic Records. They have developed a loyal live fan base with performances at many festivals including Coachella and Lollapalooza while headlining shows at the Greek Theatre, Central Park'sSummer Stage and Red Rocks with the Colorado Symphony.

Personal life[edit]

Jollett's father died in 2015.^[4] He and his wife Lizette have a son and a daughter and live in the Silver Lake neighborhood of Los Angeles.^[5]

References[edit]

1. ^Mikel F. Jollett at californiabirthindex.org
2. ^https://www.nytimes.com/books/best-sellers/2020/06/14/hardcover-nonfiction/
3. ^Thurston, Susan (2011-12-05). 'Mikel Jollett finding his voice with Airborne Toxic Event'. Toledo Blade.
4. ^ ^abcdeZack, Jessica (2020-05-26) [2020-05-23]. 'Datebook: Putting the pieces back together after escaping a California cult at age 5'. San Francisco Chronicle.
5. ^ ^abcPatrick, Bethanne (2020-05-20). 'How indie rocker Mikel Jollett overcame the toxic events in his life'. Los Angeles Times.
6. ^'The Airborne Toxic Event's 6th Record: What We Know - This Is Nowhere'. This Is Nowhere. Retrieved 2018-04-14.
7. ^Bonca, Carnel (2014-10-24). 'The Sob in the Spine'. Los Angeles Review of Books.
8. ^California YMCA Youth & Government's 1992 Commemorative Book
9. ^'Tweet by Mikel Jollett'. Twitter. 2017-05-23.
10. ^Hua, Vanessa (2009). 'In Tune With the Toxic'. Stanford Alumni.
11. ^'Mikel Jollett on Twitter'. Twitter. Retrieved 2018-04-14.
12. ^Domanick, Andrea (2011-10-20). 'Airborne Toxic Event Want You On the Edge of Their Seat'. L.A. Weekly. Retrieved 2018-04-14.
13. ^'The Airborne Toxic Event: Rock Gets Literary'. NPR.org. Retrieved 2018-04-14.
14. ^'Toxic History, Prelude: The Writer - This Is Nowhere'. This Is Nowhere. 2014-10-02. Retrieved 2018-04-14.
15. ^'Hollywood Park by Mikel Jollett'. Celadon Books. 2019-11-11. Retrieved 2019-11-19.
16. ^https://www.nytimes.com/books/best-sellers/2020/06/14/hardcover-nonfiction/
17. ^'The Airborne Toxic Event Joins Forces With Colorado Symphony For Rare, Unforgettable Concert Experience - InstantEncore'. www.instantencore.com. Archived from the original on 2011-10-06. Retrieved 2018-04-14.
18. ^'NEWS: iTunes #1 Alternative Song of the Year - The Airborne Toxic Event'. The Airborne Toxic Event. 2008-12-06. Retrieved 2018-04-14.
19. ^'Gold & Platinum - RIAA'. RIAA. Retrieved 2018-04-14.