When a High School Fight Tears a Community Apart
From the first page of Sameer Pandya's timely and timeless new novel, 'Our Beautiful Boys,' we're dropped into a series of contradictions. We're introduced to a town that's described as 'nothing extraordinary,' but then ushered to a trio of caves cloaked in mystery and lore. We're told these caves are very old, but then we focus in on contemporary dramas. Thus, the tone is set — here is a novel that carefully plays with assumptions, expectations and subversions.
At the center of the novel is Vikram Shastri, an Indian American 11th grader living in Southern California, who is recruited for his high school's football team. Vikram's parents, Gita and Guatam, are none too thrilled — American football is an undeniably violent sport. And as the family's cherished photo of Vikram's great-grandfather marching with the Mahatma Gandhi illustrates, violence of any type is not the Shastri way.
But Vikram wants to play. As he pursues the sport, he finds himself thrust into a wildly unexpected alliance with two other boys: Diego Cruz, an 11th grader of Latin American descent who, pressured by his single mother, plays in the hopes that football will land him a full ride to college; and MJ Berringer, the Yale-bound senior quarterback who is actively wrestling with the privilege inherent in being white and wealthy.
As it turns out, all three boys have unpleasant histories with another kid around school: a troubled outcast named Stanley Kincaid. And those unpleasant histories come to the fore one fateful night. Looking to celebrate a football victory, Vikram, Diego and MJ attend a party at an abandoned house in the hills outside their town, and while exploring the aforementioned caves, which are nearby, they have a physical altercation with Stanley. After the fight, they flee the scene, and when Stanley finally emerges sometime later, the boys see that he's terribly hurt, with wounds that far exceed what the boys say they inflicted. Stanley claims that one of the three boys returned alone and is responsible for the most severe of his injuries, though he's not sure which one because it was dark and he was intoxicated. And with that, we're thrust into a series of events that force the characters, their parents and the reader to grapple with the ways the boys' different backgrounds impact their experience of being accused of wrongdoing.
Is this a book about race relations? Absolutely and from multiple directions. It's also a book about class. And immigration. And opportunism. And gender. And marriage. And parenthood. And America.
These are big, familiar topics, but Pandya's approach to unpacking them stands out. First, it's not Black and white (racially) nor black and white (morally). Racially, with its cast of Latino and Indian characters, the book urges us to reckon with the ways nonwhite Americans view and engage with one another. And morally, the novel doesn't offer clear or easy answers. Pandya presents flawed but understandable people trying to navigate a murky situation with high stakes: the futures of these boys. The second thing that stands out is Pandya's gorgeous yet understated storytelling. The book's tone highlights that the struggles in 'Our Beautiful Boys' are not exceptional dilemmas but rather uncomfortably common situations.
Above all else, 'Our Beautiful Boys' is a book about the lies we knowingly or unwittingly tell ourselves. This is a book that highlights how we internalize and project certain perceptions, and what we're willing to do and say so we can feel accepted.
In this way, the three caves, as stark and mysterious as ever, are not just a setting but also a metaphor. Vikram, Diego and MJ are just as opaque as those rocky tunnels; they haven't even begun to explore the depths of who they are. I was reminded with every twist and turn in this story — and they are plentiful — that each of us is a cave of our own.
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USA Today
4 hours ago
- USA Today
Nelly Korda calls hole locations at unrelenting KPMG Women's PGA 'almost impossible'
FRISCO, Texas – The KPMG Women's PGA Championship blew by its television window by just over an hour. Coverage moved from NBC Sports to Peacock, and with American star Lexi Thompson in contention midway through her back nine and two-time major winner Minjee Lee on top of the board, it marked another missed opportunity for the LPGA. There were no weather delays. Play at Fields Ranch East started at 6:37 a.m. in twosomes, and it took world No. 1 Nelly Korda, one of the fastest players on tour, 3 hours and 9 minutes to play the front nine – in a twosome. During a long wait on the drivable par-4 seventh, Ruoning Yin sat underneath her sun umbrella and told her caddie, David Jones, that she wanted to go to sleep. 'I'll wake you up,' he replied. With winds gusting more than 35 mph and feels-like temperatures approaching 100, it was a taxing day from start to finish. Sunday is forecast to bring more of the same, so officials are sending players out in threesomes. When asked what could be done to improve pace of play, Korda said that in these conditions, it's too hard to hold the greens. 'The hole locations are kind of in almost impossible positions,' said Korda, 'where not many people are hitting the greens, so obviously it's going to take a lot more time.' Fields Ranch built to house championships The Home of the PGA of America was built to host major championships. The PGA Championship will be contested here in 2027, and the KPMG Women's PGA will return in 2031. The men's event will be held a full month earlier, however, which should yield softer, cooler conditions. Given the makeup of a typical LPGA gallery and volunteer base – families with young children and seniors – moving away from this summer heat is certainly a topic of conversation this week. U.S. Women's Open dates have shifted of late between late May and early July. The dates for the 2031 USWO at Oakland Hills Country Club have yet to be decided, so there's a chance that something could change. Locals suggest hosting nothing here in the summer past June 1. Lauren Coughlin was packing up her golf travel bag by the clubhouse as the final groups were making the turn. Coughlin, a two-time winner on the LPGA, noted that the cut was actually higher at the 2024 U.S. Women's Open at Lancaster Country Club (8 over), but there weren't many complaints about setup outside of the 12th hole on Thursday. 'Lancaster was very difficult, and it demanded a lot,' said Coughlin, 'but if you hit good golf shots you were rewarded. I think you can hit good golf shots out here and not be rewarded, and that's the difference.' Stacy Lewis told Golfweek on Friday that the course was 'making very good players look silly' and attributed the slow play to setup. Scoring average at KPMG is highest in a decade The scoring average on Saturday was 76.065, the highest major championship round in a decade on the LPGA. The opening par 5 ranked hardest, and, according to LPGA stats guru Justin Ray, its 5.603 average is the highest scoring average on an opening hole in the last 30 years on tour. There were only three birdies on the day and one triple-bogey, posted by Thompson, who, incredibly, managed to play the rest of the round in even par. Charley Hull carded one of only three birdies on the par-4 sixth hole Saturday. When asked if she took some satisfaction in that, Hull said her 1-over 73 over the Gil Hanse design felt solid. 'Just one of those golf courses that, I don't know, like it can be a bit tricky with the rough, and then the way that they designed a few holes, when the prevailing winds are downwind, you can't stop it anyway, and then you need to bump it in, but you can't bump it in because of the kind of grass that it is," said Hull, referring to the Northbridge Bermuda. 'I don't know, it's just like a golf course design that makes it so tricky.' Only two holes averaged below par, the reachable par-5 ninth and the drivable par-4 15th. Officials had to switch the ninth and 18th holes for this championship to make room for hospitality. The 2023 Senior PGA ended on a reachable par 5. The 18th this week, however, has had more double bogeys over the course of three rounds (22) than birdies (15). Crews trying to keep greens softer Officials say the greens have been watered every night and morning due to the extreme heat and high winds and will be watered once again this evening. There were six holes on Saturday in which less than 40 percent of the field hit the green in regulation. Startling given that the tour average is 68.8 percent for the season. Nelly Korda hit nine greens in regulation in the third round and is averaging 63 percent for the week, 11 percent less than her 2025 average. Minjee Lee posted the only bogey-free day of the round so far this week on Saturday, a 3-under 69, and carries a four-shot lead into the final round over Jeeno Thitikul, the best player on tour without a major. They're the only two players under par for the tournament. Thompson trails by seven and Korda by eight. When the Senior PGA was held here in May 2023, shortly after the golf course opened, Steve Stricker and Padraig Harrington went into a playoff after finishing knotted at 18 under. Conditions were softer and cooler with less wind, miles away from what the LPGA's best have experienced this week, and more in line with the PGA Championship field will likely see in two years. 'The thing is, it's so hard for us to speak out, because I feel like then people are going to think that we're whining,' Korda told Golfweek after the round, 'but the men, their apex is so much higher, so when they do land it on the green, they can do more with it, at the end of the day. 'Our apexes only get so high, and they only can get so high in 35 mph wind. If there's 35 mph gusts, then it's so hard for us to actually float it into these greens because you're trying to penetrate through the wind and not have the ball blow all over the place. 'It is a major championship, and it should play hard. I think 100 percent it should play hard. But good shots need to also be rewarded, and I feel like you're always on defense right now.'
Newsweek
6 hours ago
- Newsweek
Daniel Ricciardo Slammed by Fans Over Controversial Social Media Post
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Los Angeles Times
7 hours ago
- Los Angeles Times
Korean American artist reflects on her parents' immigrant experience in Tustin gallery exhibit
When Korean American artist Wendy Park was growing up in Southern California in the 1980s and '90s, the Compton Fashion Center swap meet was her playground. 'I grew up with immigrant parents from Korea and we worked in the swap meets all over L.A. We did Norwalk, Palmdale, Paramount and Compton was a place that I remember vividly,' said Park. 'I remember it being such a beautiful, colorful place.' Park's early life at the swap meet and her parents' immigrant experience are at the center of her third solo exhibition at Various Small Fires OC gallery in Tustin. Titled 'Of Our Own,' Park's paintings explore artifacts and rituals of daily life as an immigrant and the objects that can connect a current home to one left behind. In the exhibition, the large doubled paneled work, ''90s Compton Swap Meet' captures an uncharacteristically quiet moment at the swap meet, void of both customers and vendors. A carousel of sunglasses for sale with hand mirrors tied to the display sits along side a jungle of plants, some hanging and others potted in plastic pink swans. A broom, trash bag and metal hand truck lean against the brick wall, evidence of the work being done, next to a stall that sells baby strollers and battery-operated toy puppies that bark and flip. 'My mom was telling me how this really was a place of community,' said Park. 'It used to be a Sears building and a Korean man bought it and made all these little stalls and inside there were more kiosks and stalls. It was a place where Korean immigrants who don't have access to starting a business could come and work.' Swap meets themselves tend to be place of community for immigrant populations. They are places where they hear their own language spoken and purchase products and ingredients specific to their needs. 'This is painted from a woman's perspective of that era,' Park said of the work. 'It was a place of opportunity for Korean immigrants.' The subject matter is an incredibly timely one, given the countless raids made by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement across the nation in recent weeks with immigrant marketplaces and hubs like Santa Fe Springs Swap Meet, MacArthur Park and downtown Santa Ana targeted locally. 'Immigrants are the most hardworking people. They leave their families, they leave everything they know to come and start a new life. It is tragic that they finally get here, overcome their struggles and maybe live a good life and then get taken away,' Park said about the current climate. 'It is heartbreaking to see. It is an unfair situation and done poorly.' Park received a BFA from Otis College of Art & Design and spent 13 years in Disney animation. The bright colors that inform her work draw on that experience while also reflecting her point of view as a child, how colorful and alive the world seemed to her then. She references both American pop and Korean folk art in her work and makes newspaper kiosks, coin laundry carts and pots of Tiger Balm worthy of investigation. In 'Charms Cash' wads of dollar bills are tightly rubber-banded and stored in a can used to hold hard candy. 'It's really difficult for immigrants to trust the banking systems,' said Park. 'They are afraid of how much information they have to give or what might happen. My parents would hide money in the house or store it at the swap meet in candy containers like this.' Park's father sold plants at the swap meet and she got in the habit of hiding things in the plastic swan pots popular in the era, which are present in 'Go Swan' alongside an open can of beer and lit cigarette over a Korean board game. Some pieces are also historic documentation of sites that might otherwise be lost to fleeting memory. 'Western and 5th' depicts Korean market signage that no longer exists, but Park recalled visiting the center as child with her grandmother and aunts. The memory was unearthed with the help of an old photo of the 1992 L.A. riots. The concept for the '90's Compton Swap Meet' piece is an idea Park said she has carried in her mind for a while and its completion was made possible partly by oral history shared by her mother. When the two of them couldn't agree on the coloring of the building facade of the Compton swap meet, Park used a hip hop music video for reference. 'My mom members it as a brick-colored storefront but I was telling her I remember it like a rainbow,' said Park. 'I was watching a Tupac music video and it showed it with these colors in it.' Her memories helped Park piece together a more accurate representation of the place she and her family spent long days. Hours at the swap meet were so demanding in fact, that the family often couldn't get to church on Sundays. 'There was actually a room inside the Compton swap meet where they would all have fellowship and pray and have Bible study on Sunday,' said Park. The religious community found at the Compton Fashion Center is depicted in the wooden crucifix featured in the work. While Park remembers the swap meet fondly, she admits her mother has expressed a desire for her talented daughter to choose a more pleasing subject to paint. 'She is like, 'you can paint anything in the world, why are you painting the swap meet?'' said Park. But while her mother sees the family's tenure at the swap meet as a time she would just as soon forget, Park said the memories give her a sense of pride and reminds her how hard her parents worked to create a better life. 'For me, it is so admirable,' said Park. Mostly, Park hopes her art will encourage people to keep an open mind about others who might be living with fear for themselves or their loved ones as ICE raids continue. Park said now is the time immigrant families like need their community more than ever. 'The biggest thing is empathy; have an open heart and protect those who need it right now,' said Park. 'A lot of people are afraid to go out and get groceries, or do simple things.' Wendy Park's solo exhibition 'Of Our Own' is on view through July 19 at VSF OC, 119 N. Prospect Ave., Tustin. The gallery is open to the public Wednesday through Saturday, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
