Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

American Psycho

3.78 of 5 stars 3.78 · rating details · 79,794 ratings · 4,002 reviews

In American Psycho, Bret Easton Ellis imaginatively explores the incomprehensible depths of madness and captures the insanity of violence in our time or any other. Patrick Bateman moves among the young and trendy in 1980s Manhattan. Young, handsome, and well educated, Bateman earns his fortune on Wall Street by day while spending his nights in ways we cannot begin to fatho...more

Paperback, 399 pages

Published March 6th 1991 by Vintage (first published 1991)

more details... edit details

Get a copy:

More…

Friend Reviews

To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.

Lists with This Book

The Most Disturbing Book Ever Written

1st out of 936 books — 3,333 voters

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling

Best Books Ever

440th out of 24,600 books — 93,863 voters

More lists with this book...

Community Reviews

(showing 1-30 of 3,000)

filter | sort: default (?) | rating details

Nov 10, 2010 brian rated it 5 of 5 stars

jason, an old high school buddy, knew i was in manhattan for a few nights and asked to meet up for dinner. fuck it, i'm a sentimental guy, and it's nice to catch up -- even with a wall street douchebag. jason told me that lisa, another old friend, would be joining. here's the conversational breakdown at dinner:

20 minutes: comparing features on their new blackberries.
40 minutes: the new zagat guide and the city's best restaurants.
20 minutes: glib commentary on people we grew up with.

lisa leave...more

234 likes · like · see review

Mar 09, 2012 Stephen rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: ebooks, psychos, 1990-1999, the-creeps, horror

Unholy...Shite!!

This may be the only book I've rated 5 stars that I have NO intention of EVER reading again. Ever. After finishing this, I was forced to wait until my brain had cooled down and re-congealed before I could cogitate sufficiently to put my experience with this novel into words.

And yet, even after almost 36 hours have ticked by, the only word that keeps bubbling up to the surface of my consciousness is...WOW

...in both the good and not so good vareity.

At first, I'd thought about try...more

235 likes · like · see review

Mar 09, 2012 karen rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: littry-fiction

THIS IS FULL OF SPOILERS - FULL TO THE BRIM. THESE ARE SOME MUSINGS THAT IN NO WAY RESEMBLE A BOOK REVIEW. YOU CAN READ IT, BUT I AM TELLING YOU STRAIGHT UP - THERE WILL BE SPOILERS. - actually, it's not that bad.

paul bryant recently reviewed/revised his review of this book (hi, paul bryant!) and i read it and the dozens of intelligent remarks his negative review sparked,both pro and anti-this book, and there isn't anything i can add to the discussion that hasn't already been said by people far...more

116 likes · like · see review

Apr 16, 2013 Petra X rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction

This book is TRUE. I live on an island of bankers, investment brokers and trust company lawyers and all of them are drunken, mad psychopaths with Jack Nicholson laughs and a propensity for getting into a lot of trouble at weekends.

They drink and they snort and they screw and they sail and they make loads of money and every now and again some of them disappear never to be heard of again. The women, the secretaries and admin staff come out from the UK husband-hunting but quickly find they are the...more

73 likes · like · see review

Jun 28, 2010 Paul rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: men who really hate women

Shelves: this-book-hates-women

(another update incorporating comments about BEE's latest novel - apparently he's still at it!)

Before we start - a quote by Norman Mailer about Bret Easton Ellis : "How one wishes this writer was without talent!"

*********

People think the pages and pages of descriptions of hacking and chopping up women are ironic.
Well, in one sense they are, but in another sense they aren't.
People who like this book should ask themselves why they want to read pages and pages of descriptions of hacking and chopp...more (another update incorporating comments about BEE's latest novel - apparently he's still at it!)

Before we start - a quote by Norman Mailer about Bret Easton Ellis : "How one wishes this writer was without talent!"

*********

People think the pages and pages of descriptions of hacking and chopping up women are ironic.
Well, in one sense they are, but in another sense they aren't.
People who like this book should ask themselves why they want to read pages and pages of descriptions of hacking and chopping up women (with the occasional man thrown in, but all the lavish descriptions with rats and nail guns and so on are just for the ladies).
I don't think people can tell what's misogynistic and what isn't any more.
Here's a real life anecdote. A couple of years ago I went into Waterstones in downtown Nottingham, and mooched around. In this shop (probably others too) the staff had put various books on display with their own handwritten enthusiastic recommendations underneath. Well, that was nice, I liked reading them, until I came to the handwritten card under American Psycho. It said something along the lines of : “after a night of getting knocked back by various women in Nottingham hostelries, what better than to pick up Bret Easton Ellis’s 80s classic and get some of my own back”. Wow! That was a little like a guy working for Waterstone's recommending “Commandant of Auschwitz” by Rudolph Hoess, with the comment “After a day of having to deal with members of the Jewish community, what better than to sink into an armchair with this book, and get some of my own back”. Believe it or not, my GR friends, I actually wrote a protest email to the manager, who wrote back with an apology and said he'd removed the tasteless comments.
You know, this book reveals how much of a different planet some people are on than the one I'm on. It's not a good feeling.

UPDATE : FROM THE PAGES OF YESTERDAY'S SUNDAY TIMES

there's this review of "Imperial Bedrooms" which is BEE's latest novel. The reviewer is Theo Tait, I never head of him and it isn't an anagram of Paul Bryant, and I am not Theo Tait, let's get that clear. So imagine how the following remarks warmed the cockles of my heart:

At 400 pages, American Psycho is probably unfinishable except by adolescents and sociopaths...[Imperial Bedrooms:] descends into a phantasmagoria involving torture, online snuff videos and the appalling abuse of prostitutes and rent boys. Ellis claims to be a moralist, by which I guess he means that it is the emptiness of the modern world that causes his characters to behave in a spectacularly louche and/or homicidal fashion. But as with many satirists, it is unclear whether he is criticising the horrors he depicts, or simply wallowing in them. Either way, Ellis's determination to rub the reader's face in the gore carriessome heavy costs. Many people have no strong desire to read sustained passages of pornographic and misogynistic violence, in which, for instance, masked men urinate on a bound actress...[other examples omitted:]... these sequences also chip away at the novel's realistic texture and leave you wondering if Imperial Bedrooms has any meaning beyond that of the average slasher film.(less)

128 likes · like · see review

Jan 27, 2008 Lauryl rated it 1 of 5 stars Recommends it for: strong stomached feminist scholars

Shelves: simultaneously-fascinating-and-horr, books-i-hated

I actually read this book a few years ago, but I stumbled across the Goodreads reviews of it, and felt I needed to add my voice, because it is such a difficult piece of lit in a lot of ways,and honestly, it probably is more deserving of a thesis paper than of a measly little review on Goodreads.
American Psycho is a brilliant book. Genius. It will no doubt deservingly be remembered as Bret Easton Ellis's masterpiece, his tour-de-force of sadist misanthropy.

I effing HATED it.

American Psycho is a b...more I actually read this book a few years ago, but I stumbled across the Goodreads reviews of it, and felt I needed to add my voice, because it is such a difficult piece of lit in a lot of ways,and honestly, it probably is more deserving of a thesis paper than of a measly little review on Goodreads.
American Psycho is a brilliant book. Genius. It will no doubt deservingly be remembered as Bret Easton Ellis's masterpiece, his tour-de-force of sadist misanthropy.

I effing HATED it.

American Psycho is a brutal satire of the American upper middle class, set amongst the yuppies of New York during the boom era of the 1980's. Patrick Bateman is the main character and narrator, a bland upwardly mobile business man whose personality is a terrifyingly blank slate. He defines himself solely by the products he uses, the clothes he wears, the places he is seen eating or partying. He is also a murderer. In the course of the book, he murders a homeless man, a colleague, and numerous prostitutes, all with less emotion than he bestows upon his hair gel.
Ellis slyly balances the relative passion with which Bateman might discuss Huey Lewis in one chapter with a dispassionate yet detailed and horrific play-by-play of rape and dismemberment in the next.
The banality and sly humor (Bateman's analysis of Whitney Huston is both disturbingly off-kilter and hilarious) of the early non-violent passages of the book make the murders all the more jarring to the senses when they start coming thick and fast at the end, and black humor gives way to an out-and-out brutality the likes of which have not been touched in any other book I've ever read.
At first glance, it seems as though it is the juxtaposition of the banal and the brutal that make American Psycho shocking. In fact, however, what wrenches the gut is the sameness of detail and emotion with which both torture and nouvelle cuisine are treated. Ellis's muse is at once a monster and a metaphor, not just for the Reagan era, but for the potential darkness of post-modernity in toto. He is a camera. His world is reduced to an inventory of details, equally weighted; a chair, a suit, an arm, a head.

Reading American Psycho is a much less enjoyable experience than you might think, based on its titillating reviews or even Guinevere Turner's smart film adaptation (which was my original impetus for reading the book). The book is many times darker, nastier, uglier, grosser, crueler than I was prepared for, and I am a pretty die hard fan of horror and true crime lit.
Like many other women who read this book, I found myself getting faint and queasy, and ended up hurling it across the room in disgust. I couldn't make it to the end. As a female and a feminist, I found the book problematic.
Of course, the character of Bateman is supposed to be vile, but his misogyny is so pronounced that I find it hard to simply glom it on with the rest of his misanthropic tics. Sure, he kills his a*hole co-worker, and a few other dudes here and there, but mostly, he kills women. And unlike the asexual murder of his colleague, these womens' deaths are hyper-sexualized. They are all committed post-coitally, they are almost all prostitutes. While I don't think that Bret Easton Ellis is unaware of the misogynist content of A.P., I nevertheless find it more disturbing because of the narrator's lack of analysis, and because of a dearth of the clever commentary Ellis sneaks in during so many other moments in the novel. It is heady territory, just waiting to be mined by some iron-willed feminist scholar with the eggs for it, but I am not that woman, and if you don't think you're that woman either, then I would STRONGLY advise avoiding American Psycho.
Putting it bluntly: the scenes of women being raped, beaten, tortured and killed in this book are numerous, long, detailed, and presented with an absolute lack of empathy. For myself, this book made me feel as though I had been sexually assaulted. And while I appreciate the genius of such a book, that doesn't mean I have to like it.(less)

160 likes · like · see review

Jun 29, 2010 Joshua Nomen-Mutatio rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: from-ages-past, fiction, spontaneous-pillow-fights

Revision: I think the comments section of this review is better than the review.

So I find myself writing much more in comments sections than I do in my own review sections. Occasionally I think I've had something good to say in these online conversations. So for this review I present a series of posts (mostly mine) from the comments section of another review of this book which basically began with some general thoughts on feminism and then veered more directly toward the book:

Message 9: Some of...more

23 likes · like · see review

view all 43 comments

Paul AP commenting is like the mafia – “I thought I was out but they draggggged me back in!” . If you checked out all the various AP threads on goodreads a...more AP commenting is like the mafia – “I thought I was out but they draggggged me back in!” . If you checked out all the various AP threads on goodreads and edited them all up and sideways, you’d have a fascinating, thoughtful book which would be better than a lot of stuff that does get published. It could be tied in with a 20th anniversary edition, which could contain extra scenes that could not be published back then because they were too gruesome! Anyway, here I am, the Rush Limbaugh of AP politics – “you bring that Brett Ellis down here and I’ll personally shove a rat up his vagina quicker than he could say I’m a Misunderstood Feminist”. I perceive in these comments you've all moved up into some rather highfalutin territory where I…can…hardly..breathe... I prefer the knockabout “yah you completely misunderstood the irony” “yah, my litcrit is bigger than yours” line of discussion but never mind. So, just a few comments for old times’ sake.

MFSO :

"I just think that one should find identical acts of violence against people equally revolting regardless of the reproductive organs of the victim "

I don’t have any problem with that and if domestic violence and rape wasn’t a 99% men-doing-it-to-women situation your point would unimpeachable. That not being the case, I find it peachable. I’m peaching it.

MFSO

"Now, I'm saying the violence against women was far, far worse in this book, but it's not worse because they're women, but because of the type of violence, the details of the descriptions, the frequency, etc. And to me this is a big difference from saying that violence against women is worse simply because they're women, which was a recurring comment I came across."

I guess I don’t really understand this. Victims are chosen because they’re victimisable. Men are bigger than women. Sexual violence is mostly a one-way street from men to women. In AP Bret throws in the odd homeless man or child or male co-worker (if I remember) but that’s a gesture, like when they had a token black on Star Trek. If the violence is not worse in AP because they’re women, what’s it worse because of?

Conrad

"This is meant to illustrate what totalized oppression looks like - it's not that Bateman has the right to kill, it's that he has the right to do so with the tacit assent from others. It shows the reader how utterly essential feminism really is by terrifying us with its absence."

Before, during and after the book was published some feminists were picketing and protesting, so that was a disappointing misunderstanding of AP to begin with. Then, the yahoos, it must be acknowledged, read AP as a gross-out nailgun-the-bitch ewwww-that-was-a-good-one celebration of their worst fantasies, as can be appreciated in the hundreds of comments on Amazon from teenage boys (and see amusing anecdote in my own review). So they miss the point. Then along comes the liberal literary set, Brett’s own constituency, and blimey charlie they miss the point too! They can’t see the feminist howl of rage which is American psycho! Comes a point where you think if a book is so thoroughly misunderstood, it’s a hideous embarrassing failure.

Final question - imagine that you substitute a Black Man for every female victim in AP and rewrite the genitalia accordingly. Would the book have been published at all? Or would all the publishers have said "You Can't Write That!"(less)
updated Mar 02, 2010 02:28am

Rachel Okaaay..
Mar 02, 2010 02:39am

Mar 24, 2012 Ian Graye added it

Shelves: reviews, to-re-read, to-re-read-soon, exert-yourself

Australian Psycho 2012

We decided to catch up for a barbecue lunch in the park, rather than the sort of dinner party we used to have.

It was difficult getting everybody together, what with kids' sport and, for those whose kids had already grown up, there was some initial reluctance because the football season had started, whatever code you followed.

I started to look at my wardrobe on Thursday, I still have everything I've ever bought that hasn't physically worn out, even jeans that I won't fit int...more

24 likes · like · see review

Sep 28, 2011 Mykle rated it 3 of 5 stars

I'm finally about able to process this book. I remember when it came out in 1991, after Ellis's first book, LESS THAN ZERO, had been a precocious publishing phenomenon and his second, THE RULES OF ATTRACTION, had sucked but sold well. Everybody was waiting for something from the guy, some answer to the question of whether or not he was a genuine talent or just last month's flavor for an increasingly trend-driven publishing world.

Then he gave us AMERICAN PSYCHO, and everybody lost their shit. No...more

38 likes · like · see review

Mar 09, 2012 Gavin rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: literary

The scariest thing about this book for me is that since I finished reading it--almost eight years ago--I still look around when I am in a crowded place at the faces of the people and wonder: Which one of you thinks like Patrick Bateman? Which one of you is ready to snap? Perhaps these other faces think the same when they look at me...

VERY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

33 likes · like · see review

Oct 07, 2012 MJ Nicholls rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: novels, merkins, nonreviews

The Correspondents #3

Dear Patrick,

I read your novel American Psycho the other week and I must protest. Firstly, Genesis’s shining moment is the single ‘I Can’t Dance’—a beautiful admission of terpsichorean ineptitude that most unpopular white males can sympathise with—not the early prog LPs like Foxtrot et al. But I write today with a more practical request in mind. I cannot pick up chicks, Patrick! I think the problem lies in my appearance. I am a wearer of spectacles and as we know, ladies dis...more

17 likes · like · see review

Feb 13, 2012 Ben Winch rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: american, anglo, problematic

I don't usually bother giving negative reviews here, but I feel it's time to nail my colours to the mast and identify a few problematic titles. Problem #1: American Psycho.

It's funny how many people qualify their glowing reviews of this book with the words 'I didn't enjoy it but...,' as if it contained some bitter but necessary medicine. Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but I would have thought even a disturbing book, movie, song or painting should at least be enjoyable on some level if it's to gain its...more I don't usually bother giving negative reviews here, but I feel it's time to nail my colours to the mast and identify a few problematic titles. Problem #1: American Psycho.

It's funny how many people qualify their glowing reviews of this book with the words 'I didn't enjoy it but...,' as if it contained some bitter but necessary medicine. Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but I would have thought even a disturbing book, movie, song or painting should at least be enjoyable on some level if it's to gain its audience's love, and if it can't gain that love then it's certainly not worthy of glowing reviews. To me, American Psycho is damn near loveless, its murder scenes especially, and I don't buy the line that there's anything medicinal in those scenes either.

What we have here is 2 books, or better, a book and a bunch of uninspired self-consciously provocative crap tacked onto it for the sake of controversy. Ellis said it himself: for the most part, American Psycho was just him writing out his frustration at his life, which corresponded closely, for the most part, to Patrick Bateman's; the murder scenes were added later. This is a telling admission. While there's something mildly enjoyable about Ellis ripping apart (in prose) the yuppies he obviously knows so well, the tone changes entirely every time a character is ripped apart for real. Satire? Yeah, parts of American Psycho are satirical, but not the violent parts - they are flat, vacant, bland. And it's a sad thing, that this young, lost, numbed writer felt the need to dress up his comedy of manners in wolf's clothing. You can imagine why he did it. Not for money necessarily, but from the same misguided notion that leads his fans to believe there is something medicinal in torturing themselves by reading this shit: the poor sap thought he was writing something 'important'! Well I'm sorry, but the only important thing about American Psycho is that it illustrates - by its existence, by its success - something deeply wrong with the society that gave birth to it. Any dickhead with a halfway decent grasp of prose could have written this splatter-porn; on the level of artistry it's dull as dull can be. But it illustrates something: the banality of evil. Brett Easton Ellis is no more a psycho than you or me, nor does he demonstrate any deep knowledge of what a psycho might be. But by parading his numbness, his naivety, his insensitivity, he demonstrates how a human might unwittingly do evil. And to my mind, there is something evil in what he's done, by seeking to legitimise this shit. In the end, there's only one question that's important here: does the world need more violence-for-violence's sake? I say absolutely not. And this is coming not from a wowser or an anti-violence lobbyist, but from a diehard fan of Clockwork Orange and Reservoir Dogs. One reviewer points out that the uproar over American Psycho is ridiculous given the number of malevolent, misogynistic slasher films on constant display in our culture, and to an extent I agree. But what I find reprehensible in American Psycho is the pose - that this is somehow above those slasher films - when Ellis himself has admitted that all the conceptual justifications only occurred to him after he was demonised, as a way to talk himself out of trouble.

Is Brett Easton Ellis a mysoginist? To me he's more like a parrot, repeating the refrain of a sick culture. Well if you need a parrot to remind you what's wrong with clinical descriptions of excessive violence towards women then this is the book for you. For my part, I'll take Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me any day if I feel like a glimpse inside psychosis. And - wrong as this may sound to some of you - I'll enjoy it. Because art is meant to be enjoyed. Yes, it can change you, hurt you, get under your skin, but only if you love it. Personally, I wonder how anyone could love American Psycho. An absolute piece of shit and probably the worst book I have ever bothered finishing.
(less)

32 likes · like · see review

Feb 06, 2008 jack rated it 4 of 5 stars

okay, this is a good book. but it is also a gnarly book. ellis got a lot of flak from feminists after this came out because a lot of people believed it was a really sexist work. i don't necessarily agree. i think ellis was making more of a commentary on the behaviors of a certain class/race group of men in a certain time and geographical location. basically rich-as-god white stockbrokers in nyc in the 80s at the height of the greed is good times. how the power they were given (a lot of it imagin...more okay, this is a good book. but it is also a gnarly book. ellis got a lot of flak from feminists after this came out because a lot of people believed it was a really sexist work. i don't necessarily agree. i think ellis was making more of a commentary on the behaviors of a certain class/race group of men in a certain time and geographical location. basically rich-as-god white stockbrokers in nyc in the 80s at the height of the greed is good times. how the power they were given (a lot of it imaginary, think SF in the late 90s during the internet boom and the subsequent crash in 2000 after the nasdaq fell. ah, good times!) corrupted them. basically they were the golden boys in a playground designed to fulfill their every whim because they carried hope for an economic upturn that was supposed to "trickle down" to the rest of us. and they became demicelebrities du jour. unsurprisingly they acted like spoiled children and insanely debaucherous roman emperors. ultimately revealing their immaturity and hollow souls.

blah blah. whatever. if you've seen the movie (which i highly highly recommend) you know what this book is really about. blood and guts. slice and dice. and one tightly wound serial killer with innards of ice.

i've seen the movie dozens of times (and this may reveal more about me than i'd like) and it's always good for a laugh. i know it's a gorefest, but hey, i love horror movies. what really kills me about it is how the excess of the times is taken to insane heights in the movie. not just the clothes and food and apartments and money, but the giddy excess of the murder scenes. the violence is gratituitous in order to be gratituitous. it illustrates its main point with itself. also, the scene of patrick bateman running bucknaked (except for a pair of expensive running shoes) down a luxury apartment building hallway phallicly wielding a chainsaw while chasing after his half-cousin who he's spent the evening slipping drugs to and fucking with abandon is high comedy in my opinion.

but back to the book. this book will entertain you. it will bore you. it will overwhelm you. it will chill and horrify you. and one word of warning: that which is seen cannot be un-seen. or i guess, in the case of a book, that which is read and visualized cannot...well, my point is: if you don't want nightmares or if you perhaps at some point in your life would like to pass by a habitrail in a petstore without full body chills stop around page 600 or so.

ellis himself said that much of the book is boring, pointless and repetitive (conversely i devoured this motherfucker like a jumbo pack of marshmallows after five bong rips) and that you could get the general gist by just reading about 200 pages. there were also parts that he said he wished that he had never written. as in, he wished he had never imagined their full horror and committed them to paper where others would have to experience them.

i know i'm not selling this book really well. it's actually amazing and you should read it. let me just say this: like many important journeys you will take it may not necessarily be pleasant, but it will be worthwhile. and perhaps you can take pleasure in that. in between feeling like barfing and wanting to bleach your brain.(less)

28 likes · like · see review

Oct 20, 2007 Dan Martin rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: people with open minds

Shelves: fiction, favorites

This book blew me away. First of all, you have to be prepared to be let into the mind of a psychopath. That entails more than murder, which a lot of people reviewing this book completely miss. Watch out for these two types of brainless reviews. "Its worth the boring stuff for the violence". or "It's misogynistic! And about murdering people. You like that?". I know it's not standard people, but a protagonist CAN be a villian. If you think experiencing or creating something makes you an advocate o...more

47 likes · like · see review

May 13, 2007 Holly added it Recommends it for: probably no one

Shelves: bannedfrommybookshelf

I could not finish this book. In fact, when I finally (and gratefully) decided to stop reading it, I could not even bring myself to return it to my bookshelf. I actually threw it in the garbage, which I have never done to another book.

It's a shame, too, because up until about 3/4 of the way through, I LOVED this book. The writing is simply brilliant, and Ellis presents a fascinating and thought-provoking view of 1980's American society, made especially poignant by the fact that it is only mildl...more

25 likes · like · see review

Apr 20, 2009 Brad rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: faves, notorious, to-read-again

When a book sticks with you, you know it is powerful. It may not be entertaining, and it may be downright disturbing, but if you can't get it out of your head it is most certainly great, and that is my experience with American Psycho.

For me, it's about the music.

Bret Easton Ellis did something miraculous within Patrick Bateman's killings: he destroyed the music of Huey Lewis and the News, Genesis and Whitney Houston. Before every nasty killing, Bateman goes on a diatribe about the music of one o...more

42 likes · like · see review

Apr 19, 2007 Gavin rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Although often described as a meditation on the vacuity of the 1980s, it's probably important to realise that an era cannot by itself create a state of vacuity, but only acts as a trapping. In this case, the 80s represents a sticky glut of technology, fashion, and media (does it sound very different to today?) that ultimately confuses and paralyses, eliminating feeling - and thereby the possibility of redemption - through sheer saturation. But psychotic behaviour is not new; it exists in everyon...more Although often described as a meditation on the vacuity of the 1980s, it's probably important to realise that an era cannot by itself create a state of vacuity, but only acts as a trapping. In this case, the 80s represents a sticky glut of technology, fashion, and media (does it sound very different to today?) that ultimately confuses and paralyses, eliminating feeling - and thereby the possibility of redemption - through sheer saturation. But psychotic behaviour is not new; it exists in everyone (in general), or at the very least in every man. It's more a question of those who indulge in it and those who suppress it.

The reader should therefore not be surprised at the ease with which Patrick Bateman (the villain and narrator) seduces us. He is as classical a gothic figure as any that Poe created, and has all the darkness and all the comedy, without quite the campiness and more wit, of a young Vincent Price. He is so beau that he is often asked if he is a model or an actor. This makes him more of an act of a gothic character than the real thing, but the artificiality here is appropriate. We abhor him, yet he resonates nonetheless. More secretly American Psycho probably also raises the occasional hard-on, which as the delineation between sex then rape then murder dissolves - and really, murder is just another form of pornography - makes us question whether not being consciously shameful of this, at least until after the chapter is over, is a natural reaction or not.

Patrick's hatred is born of a surprisingly touching fear of everything that is not a part of his own construction; anything with the possibility of gentle or joyous emotion by its nature cannot exist for him, and must be destroyed. Tossing a handful of coins into a seal pool in an attempt to choke them, he tells us that "[i]t's not the seals I hate - it's the audience's enjoyment of them that bothers me". Shortly after he stabs a five-year-old child in the throat and is not satisfied; the child had "no real history, no worthwhile past" and the killing leaves him empty. By conflating the extreme opposites we see not only the boundaries of human abbhorence - apparently limitless, there is little that Patrick would not do in the mutilation and annihilation of a human - but also, in our own sympathy to him, the extreme lengths humans are willing to go to to forgive one of their own, to abstract the blame into something larger and ambiguous. Or perhaps we should be more cynical, and suggest that our sympathy for him is merely of our own inclinations towards such darkness - again, classical gothic.

There is more to pick up here, much more, that distinguishes it in many ways as a product of the modern era, but I feel the main lesson here is not in the story but in our reactions to it, of our own following self-analysis. That's what I got anyway. For some it may simply result in a deadening of certain senses, disgust or paranoia; for me it was all good for self-awareness.

Damn, out of space - I'll have to try to post the rest of the review in comments!(less)

12 likes · like · see review

Sep 24, 2007 Kecia added it Recommends it for: no one

Shelves: banned-books, 1001-books

When this book was first published I could not wait to read it. I was already a BEE fan and I thought it completely horrible that the book was being censored and protested by people who had probably never read it. The day of its release I ran to my local bookseller for a copy. Nothing attracts me like a controversial book!

I think Daniel's review on this board captures my feelings like none other. I too wish I could unread it. The images of rape, murder and torture have stayed with me all these y...more

10 likes · like · see review

Dec 06, 2012 [P] rated it 3 of 5 stars

I'm not a hater, as my rating will attest, but, let's be honest, this novel is about as messy as a corpse after Bateman has finished with it. The writing is, to put it kindly, uneven, the plot pretty repetitious, and the 'it's all in the mind' angle an entirely ludicrous attempt by the author to appear intellectual [it is, in fact, the 'serious' writer equivalent of "and then I woke up."]. But, as American Psycho is a satire, one is able to forgive most of its sins in good conscience.

Ellis hims...more I'm not a hater, as my rating will attest, but, let's be honest, this novel is about as messy as a corpse after Bateman has finished with it. The writing is, to put it kindly, uneven, the plot pretty repetitious, and the 'it's all in the mind' angle an entirely ludicrous attempt by the author to appear intellectual [it is, in fact, the 'serious' writer equivalent of "and then I woke up."]. But, as American Psycho is a satire, one is able to forgive most of its sins in good conscience.

Ellis himself called it a feminist novel, which is clearly nonsense. It is a claim that is, quite transparently, simply an ill-thought out attempt to defend the work during the height of its controversy. None of the characters, neither male nor female, come out of the book with any credit; the focus is, without question, the vacuous nature of affluent Americans [isn't all his work?], rather than an exploration of masculine attitudes or behaviour.

Is it shocking? It depends on your point of reference, for me Canetti’s Auto-Da-Fe was a far more shocking read [Mutilated dwarf! Mutilated dwarf!!], as was Dostoevski’s Demons, and Cendrars' Moravagine is weirder. American Psycho I merely find preposterous; it is vaudeville, over-the-top, cartoonish; it is, indeed, probably sat on my bookshelves at this very moment laughing sinisterly and twisting its 'tache. [As a quick way of determining whether you would be upset by this novel, ask yourself this question: do you or did you [everyone has pretty much forgotten about him now] find Eminem shocking? Because American Psycho comes from a similar place as the squeaky-voiced pop-rap cretin].

One major thing in its favour, however, is that it is, in places, very funny, and that is because we all, to some extent, know or have known a Bateman. By this I mean someone who makes toe-curling statements, is essentially unpopular, is desperately uncool, and aching to ‘fit in’ [my friends and I refer to these kind of people as a 'Colin Hunt.' http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqwDoM...]. In fact, if this novel has a subtext it is that of a misfit who wants to be liked and respected, who [either in reality or fantasy] takes out his frustrations, his feelings of inferiority, on his victims. The murders could be seen, in this context, as a strange form of empowerment.

So, three stars? Yeah, go on then. It’s a book that I like less and less as I get older, but which delighted me as a teenager, and so it deserves that rating if only for reasons of nostalgia. (less)

10 likes · like · see review

Jul 25, 2008 Bryce Wilson rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: literature

Because sometimes life is shit.

This is the way Satire should be, no mercy no quarter. I love the construction of the novel, the way Bateman's madness is revealed gradually just dropped phrases, and idle thoughts which are given no more or less weight then the descriptions of conspicuous consumption that fill the book. How nothing actually happens for the first hundred and fifty pages or so, so by that time you're almost wanting some insanity to drop. And when it does it's just like "Oh God No."...more

22 likes · like · see review

Mar 30, 2008 Kristopher Jansma rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: bookblog

Thank God that somebody stopped me from putting this on the required reading list for my Gothic Monsters class before I had actually read it. Actually, that would be my aforementioned fiancee again. Given my typical pattern of assigning reading to the students that I haven't yet read myself... this could have been disastrous. I was expecting some fairly graphic violence, given its a book about a serial killing maniac, but Ellis also uses his expert skills in rendering sex scenes that are probabl...more
Thank God that somebody stopped me from putting this on the required reading list for my Gothic Monsters class before I had actually read it. Actually, that would be my aforementioned fiancee again. Given my typical pattern of assigning reading to the students that I haven't yet read myself... this could have been disastrous. I was expecting some fairly graphic violence, given its a book about a serial killing maniac, but Ellis also uses his expert skills in rendering sex scenes that are probably too graphic for your less reputable pornographic magazines. Still, all this I could have taken for what it was - I'm not as big on sex in my literature as some (see previous entry on Nicholson Baker) but I'm no prude either. The whole thing reminded me quite unpleasantly of all the Ellis/Palahniuk imitators I shared workshops with in my MFA program. Still, I figured I'd skim past whatever was too gruesome. But I couldn't finish it. And oddly, my issues with the book are prompted by my latest discussion in my Introduction to Creative Writing class. Namely, our day on Plot.

But first. The book is about Christian Bale... er, Patrick Bateman, sorry, yuppie schmuck extraordinare, who, in addition to murdering people, also obsesses over designer labels, morning talk shows, keeping up with his smug, rich friends, sleeping around and renting porn, and getting the perfect dinner reservations. I admit, for the first 100 pages or so, I was enjoying it quite a bit. After all, who wouldn't love a well-written glimpse into the mind of a wall street psychopath? For a 100 pages or so, Bateman's tendency to describe the clothing of everyone he sees like something out of the J. Peterman Catalogue is funny and off-beat. I enjoyed his shallow bantering with his even shallower friends about how one wears tie-clips and whether or not vests can be worn with suits and if one can wear gray socks with black shoes. Ellis keeps the writing crisp and the details rich, and for that it comes across as fine satire. I didn't even mind that Bateman, while seemingly more intelligent than his companions, is by far the worse human being (due to all the murdering).

So that's 100 pages. Then the next 100 pages go about the same way. Patrick commits a few murders while we read on, which we can tell are not his first. He has some more lude sex, buys a tanning bed for personal use... etc. There's one surprising scene where he thinks about killing his mistress's husband in a bathroom and the husband misinterprets the near-strangling for a come-on... But then it's more craziness and another murder and some more sex. And more designers and more fashion advice with his friends. And so on. At page 200 I stopped reading, realizing I was now halfway through the book and had not really any sort of interest in continuing. I wondered why and realized that there simply wasn't anything I wanted to know anymore. I didn't care if he got caught or got away with it. I didn't care if he killed his co-worker with the better account than he has (though a plot summary tells me he will (maybe)). I didn't care if he killed his mistress's husband or himself, for that matter. It wasn't that I wasn't enjoying the actual reading... I just didn't particularly care how it ended.

In my Plot class we talked about some pretty standard formulas for structuring a story - some of which are downright mechanical - but going all the way back to Aristotle, there were some pretty clear guidelines. For one thing, your protagonist, even if we dislike him immensely, has to want something and we have to care whether or not he gets it. Bateman's desires seem pretty simple: he wants everything he hasn't got already. He's not killing people and torturing animals to any particular end - he doesn't even really seem to enjoy doing it. So we don't particularly care if it all works out for him or not. I respect Ellis for maybe wanting to just avoid the typical plot of "Let's all see if the bad guy gets what's coming to him!" But you ought to give us something? He doesn't want to change. He doesn't want more money or better sex (except maybe the money and sex that everyone else seems to have). He doesn't want to stop killing people or to kill anyone in particular. I'm sure people will tell me that Bateman's shiftless desireless life is somehow endemic of the corrupt soul of America...*yawn* ... or that characters in our glorious post-modern world don't need to want anything in particular (other than everything and anything)... but then fine. It makes no difference then if I read 200 pages or 400 or 50. Without a plot the only thing I'm missing is more of the same.

Aristotle, in "Poetics" writes that "Of all plots and actions the episodic are the worst. I call a plot 'episodic' in which the episodes or acts succeed one another without probable or necessary sequence. Bad poets compose such pieces by their own fault, good poets, to please the players; for, as they write show pieces for competition, they stretch the plot beyond its capacity, and are often forced to break the natural continuity."

This little passage has been of great concern to me lately, because I've been working on a new book that is fairly episodic. During my class on Plot I began to realize the importance of some sort of unifying thread between the episodes - something that keeps you reading, something so it will matter if you decide to skip over whole chapters or not. My plot summary tells me that Bateman will kill his co-worker (who, frankly, at page 200 is still barely distinguishable from the others in my mind) and then hear that this co-worked is actually still alive - leading both the reader and the psycho himself to wonder if he's really killed the man or just is so insane that he can't tell his imagination from reality. Not a bad hook - that almost even sounds like a plot. Too bad he didn't open with that instead of closing with it.
(less)

12 likes · like · see review

Nov 21, 2007 Kelsey rated it 5 of 5 stars

This book is really amazing. It takes place in the "greed is good" era of 1980's America and is a picture of the flashy, monied life of wall street bankers. The main character - Patrick Bateman - is depicted in such a memorable way that I think he's really one of the all time stand out characters in literature.

This isn't pleasure reading - the book is sometimes hard to get through due to the long, long desciptions of either 80's music and culture or else the graphic descriptions of Patrick Batem...more

6 likes · like · see review

Nov 26, 2011 Denae rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: the-fuck-is-this-the-fuck-was-that, read-in-2011, challenge-1010-by-2020

Well, I have now read American Psycho. I now feel completely justified in my previous suspicion that Bret Easton Ellis is not the author for me. Oh, when it isn't taking itself seriously, the book is very well-written. Even the originally incredibly irritating repetitive detailing of brand names and prices and food became a part of the rhythm of the book in a way I was not expecting. Patrick Bateman is certainly a psychopath, whether his crimes are only in his head or real. With all of these thi...more

5 likes · like · see review

Aug 11, 2011 Madeleine rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: what-he-brought-to-the-bearriage, peer-pressure, the-face-is-familar, mmxi, our-libeary, maybe-it-s-time-to-live

Is Patrick Bateman a murderous sociopath? Or just some narcissistic Wall Street yuppie whose delusions of grandeur nearly had me puking all over the book? I have no bloody clue because the only way I could get through this novel was reading it as an allegory for the evil of capitalism. That's not the point, I'm sure, but it did make things interesting, if not bearable.

The only real answer I can offer is to the question of whether Brett Easton Ellis is a writer with whom I'd voluntarily spend 15...more Is Patrick Bateman a murderous sociopath? Or just some narcissistic Wall Street yuppie whose delusions of grandeur nearly had me puking all over the book? I have no bloody clue because the only way I could get through this novel was reading it as an allegory for the evil of capitalism. That's not the point, I'm sure, but it did make things interesting, if not bearable.

The only real answer I can offer is to the question of whether Brett Easton Ellis is a writer with whom I'd voluntarily spend 15 minutes alone (which is a resounding 'hell no'). As much as I'd like to pick his brain, I'm afraid of what would ultimately happen to mine -- microwaved? stapled to the floor? fed to a chow?

I will say, for its more gruesome moments (and there are many, all of which are infinitely more visceral than anything I've read before -- and I've read a lot of King, which means I've mostly unflinchingly encountered a dude's manhood unceremoniously shoved into his mouth and left to rot), the quality of the writing was damn good. Ellis does whirlwind narratives well, and he's a mighty fine wordsmith.

Unfortunately, Ellis also has a knack for creating some deeply disturbed and deeply disturbing characters. Yes, the main character is horrifying for his realism, which is a testament to Ellis's skills as a writer. The violence could have turned into a self-parodying bloodbath. Bateman could have dissolved into a prattling cliche. But.... hey, I've got a vivid imagination, too, and a selectively weak stomach to go along with it, so picturing some of the scenes was a bit much for me at times. As much as I'm inclined to believe that this book is an eerily accurate depiction of what goes on in a sociopath's mind, I enjoyed being trapped in Bateman's head very little. He is probably the least reliable narrator in modern literature and.... okay, that part of it WAS entirely too entertaining. Every thought spilling from Bateman's unstable mind was as plausible as getting reservations for eight-o'-clock tonight at Dorsia, and that knowledge had me snickering over certain passages far more than any sane person should.

In short: It's a good book, yes, but I'll be damned if I'm ever reading it again.(less)

6 likes · like · see review

Jul 13, 2008 John rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: readers with guts of iron, psychopaths, yuppie scum, Jared Leto

Shelves: summer-reading-2008

When I walked up to the counter of my local bookstore (Denver's famous Tattered Cover) with American Psycho in my hand, the attendant behind the counter offered me a warning. "Ah yes," he said, mind reeling back to the bestsellers of seventeen years ago, "I remember reading this one when it came out. Not for the faint of heart, I'm afraid..."

"...more like the strong of stomach."

Although I had seen the motion picture adaptation of the novel and was vaguely aware of the violence the book contained...more When I walked up to the counter of my local bookstore (Denver's famous Tattered Cover) with American Psycho in my hand, the attendant behind the counter offered me a warning. "Ah yes," he said, mind reeling back to the bestsellers of seventeen years ago, "I remember reading this one when it came out. Not for the faint of heart, I'm afraid..."

"...more like the strong of stomach."

Although I had seen the motion picture adaptation of the novel and was vaguely aware of the violence the book contained, at the time of purchase, I had no idea how apt that warning would be. And now, 400 grueling pages later, I can think of no better way to begin a review of this startling, but certainly worthwhile, novel.

Some experts on serial killers will repeatedly insist that this class of psychopath is not necessarily bad (at least not irredeemably so), but simply misunderstood. After taking a look at the amount of negative, hamfisted reviews of American Psycho on this very website, I'm inclined to give the same benefit of the doubt to Bret Easton Ellis' novel. Although its content is undeniably gruesome, writing off the novel as 'bad' or even 'unreadable' due to graphic content is like saying you can't stand to watch a hockey game when the gloves come off. Because while the shock and awe factor is certainly present, there is much more to this story than that.

However, even though I was fascinated by the book, I don't want to defend it to the point of downplaying its graphic content. Although the first 100 pages are relatively tame, building the yuppie side of protagonist Patrick Bateman and the utterly stupefying wealth he's surrounded by, the remaining three-quarters of the book is chock full of the most disgusting violence I've ever read. This is the kind of graphic stuff that would make Stephen King blush. Rape, disfigurement, torture and bloody murder quickly become recurring scenes in the book, as Bateman's sadistic side gets the better of him, and if you're still reading at this point, it's time to make a decision: set it down and miss out on a terrifying examination of the yuppie lifestyle at its worst, or press on and keep squirming for a few hundred more pages.

For me, the choice was an easy one to make on: suck it up and keep reading.

Ellis' fantastic writing style is what made it possible to stomach these graphic scenes. In the hands of a less-dedicated author, these torturous descriptions would have been either completely depraved or humorously amateurish, but Easton always handles it with this idea gently throbbing in the background: this is satire at its finest (and most grim). Which is to say that American Psycho is one of the most unusual books I've ever read. As numerous reviewers have already pointed out, the book spends a lot of time developing setting, but with great attention to (superficial) detail. None of Bateman's business associates are introduced without an explicit description of the brand-name duds they're wearing, but all of Pateman's victims are provided with the most crude physical descriptions possible (especially the women). Yuppie businessmen are all attractive, faceless entities; the names 'Ralph Lauren' and 'Giorgio Armani' appear more often--and are more telling details--than the names or actions of Bateman's colleagues on Wall Street.

There is a also an understated comedic element to American Psycho, although it is often merely a tense laugh, an uncomfortable pause between grizzly violent episodes. Take the three chapters spread throughout the book where Bateman discusses his love for popular 1980s musical artists (Whitney Houston, Genesis, and Huey Lewis and the News) ad nauseum. Incidentally, I loved these chapters as much as any other part of the book, and thought they provided a welcome comedic break in the monotony of Bateman's daily rituals of working out, booking reservations at five-star restaurants, and dismembering prostitutes in his upscale Manhattan apartment. I say again, the novel is not without its humorous flirtations, although it's usually a comedy as dark as Patrick's own twisted desires.

My main problem with the book is in the last 100 pages or so, the continuity to disintegrate (don't worry, no big spoilers here). At a time where the story could have been elevated above all the violent depravity and yuppie greed embodied by Patrick's character (somehow), Ellis lets Bateman's final descent into insanity pass by without much of a climax. Maybe this is a reflection of the protagonist's mental stability losing all footing, but I found the ending sort-of disappointing. Readers that need a story with a definitive, concrete ending will probably be even more confused or let down by the end of the book. There are some occurrences that bring into question Bateman's entire perception of the acts he's committed ('was it a dream or wasn't it?'), but no certain answer is given. Although this is a far more interesting ending than some grim grand finale would have been, it's also less exciting, and for readers who have spent devoted this much time to reading about this sicko's twisted fantasies--or reality--I think it's natural to want to see some justice done to him. In a tangible way, this doesn't really happen. But in a more abstract sense, the fact that Bateman never receives the punishment he deserves for what he's done--but is still the victim of his own crazed fantasies--is one of the most interesting twists in the novel. I think the ending is the most contentious part of the novel, even more so than the adult content contained beforehand, and without giving away what transpires, I'll just say a lot of it is left open to interpretation: very little is spelled out for the reader.

Overall, it didn't take long for me to realize that the warning the book store clerk had given me when I bought American Psycho was dead-on. This is not a book that I would recommend to anyone casually, nor one I would just pick up and read again on a whim. The adjectives used to describe American Psycho--disturbing, grim, violent--are enough to make this an unforgettable read, but also just cause for many people to be offended by the book's content, or (hopefully) avoid it altogether. But I feel anyone who gave this novel an honest chance and still came away feeling like it was nothing more than 'pornography' might be missing a big part of the story. While reading American Psycho, I didn't feel like Ellis' intent was to subject his readers to the kind of blunt, repetitive violence reminiscent of a prison beating--although I could see how someone else might, I guess. Instead, I felt that his novel required this sort of demented protagonist, these scenes of horrific behavior, to give a startling glimpse into a possible by-product of an American lifestyle built on the worst human emotions. As Bateman describes himself early on in the novel, "I have all the characteristics of a human being: blood, flesh, skin, hair; but not a single, clear, identifiable emotion, except for greed and disgust." By the end of the book, the protagonist is an impossible character to like, but an even more difficult one to understand. For my money, Ellis' mere attempt to make a monster like Patrick Bateman come to life on the page is reason enough to give American Psycho an earnest try. Just make sure you don't read it while eating.(less)

17 likes · like · see review

Mar 29, 2008 E rated it 4 of 5 stars

I've been reading books that were technically "too old" for me for a long time-- I'd hit the Adult Fiction section of my local library by age 1o-- but it rarely happens that upon finish/reading a book, I think, "Uh-oh. This was a bad idea."

I'm not saying that looking back on my ten year-old self reading Lord of the Flies and 1984, I think there wasn't any minor scarring from that, but I have a steady head and a strong stomach. Aside from American Psycho, the only story I regret reading is Chuck...more

8 likes · like · see review

Jun 12, 2012 Ritz rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: a todo sado/masoquista adorador de relatos sobre horribles asesinos

Recommended to Ritz by: Israel Calzadilla

Shelves: novelas, horror_suspenso_terror_thrillers, autor_e_f, abandonados_a_medio_leer, literatura-contemporánea, literatura, literatura-anglosajona

Lamento casi con vergüenza, pero siendo fiel a la honestidad, que a Psicópata Americano después de haberme hecho infinitas expectativas y empezar a leerlo, me tuve que esforzar bastante para sostener mis ojos sobre larguísimas listas de detalles sobre marcas, vinos, más marcas y restaurantes, listas sobre quien conoce a quien y quien se folla a quien. El libro es genial, ojo, pero no para mí. El texto exige el lector tanta atención a los detalles que si te aburres y te saltas algo en alguna list...more Lamento casi con vergüenza, pero siendo fiel a la honestidad, que a Psicópata Americano después de haberme hecho infinitas expectativas y empezar a leerlo, me tuve que esforzar bastante para sostener mis ojos sobre larguísimas listas de detalles sobre marcas, vinos, más marcas y restaurantes, listas sobre quien conoce a quien y quien se folla a quien. El libro es genial, ojo, pero no para mí. El texto exige el lector tanta atención a los detalles que si te aburres y te saltas algo en alguna lista pues te pierdes un asesinato (que después de todo eso es lo que uno quiere leer no?). Llegué hasta aproximadamente el tercer o cuarto asesinato – y los que lo han leído saben que leí bastante - y lo volví a poner en el estante antes de terminarlo. En cambio la película me fascinó - ¡Cuélguenme por ello!

En mi opinión el libro es tedioso, entiendo que el tedio tiene una finalidad y lo respeto y lo admiro. La narración para mi fue un eterno inventario demasiado detallado... un punto a favor para los que disfrutan el sadismo, cuando llegan los asesinatos los describe con la misma rigurosidad de los inventarios. Ese es el point de este libro, que aunque no me gustó se lo reconozco: le mete el dedo y lo mueve dentro de la llaga que es la insensibilidad del mundo contemporáneo: Es lo mismo leer una carta en un restaurante, meterse un pase de coca, y descuartizar a alguien.

Creo que un punto neurálgico de Psicópata Americano es la pérdida de los límites, del exceso por el exceso mismo. En estos términos se habla prácticamente de conceptos abstractos.

Yo no terminé de leer Psicópata Americano porque precisamente la pérdida de límites me quedó claro después ****Spoiler*** del asesinato de la chica a la que le arranca la carne de los dedos de las manos a mordiscos***. Me quedó claro, punto. El libro no me gustó, fue demasiado apara mí, no por lo sádico y explicito sino por lo reiterativo y aburrido. Dos características que seguramente le valieron muchos méritos en su momento, porque fue distinto y fue más allá.

No lo calificaría de misógino ¿Por qué? Creo que por que creo en la libertad de creación, simplemente por eso.

Hay algo que respeto mucho de Elli, tuvo que tener guáramo no sólo para publicar sino para escribir y hoy en día para llevar sobre sus hombros cualquier cantidad de juicios que pesen sobre su “persona” a través de un libro.

Lo digo yo que soy mujer. Lo digo yo a quien no le gustó el libro.

(Pero Lunar Park es lo MÁXIIIIMOOO)(less)

3 likes · like · see review

Apr 18, 2007 JT rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Fiction

Shelves: totallyscrewedup, topsmyfriendstops

In my mind this book has no equal. The story goes beyond disturbing, it is a maniacs wet dream. Which is all the more creepy seeing as I LOVE THIS BOOK. Honestly there are sections where the graphic nature of the subject matter makes you want to hoark up the meal you just ate. To me though that is the bonus to the book! If you want to lose yourself in one of the more twisted fictional minds, far better than Hannibal the Cannibal, take a trip down this mo-fo's screwed up reality. As twisted as th...more

10 likes · like · see review

Nov 16, 2012 Michael Fierce rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: fans of serial killer books and the fashion trendy

Recommended to Michael by: Jack, owner of The Dark Carnival Bookstore in Berkeley, CA

Shelves: serial-killer, horror

I bought American Psycho the first week it was out in March of 1991 at my favorite book store in the world, The Dark Carnival, in Berkeley, California.

The guy that owns The Dark Carnival, Jack, recommended it to me, who's been working there behind the counter since I was 10 years old. I was 20 when I bought this.

After I finished this book I went right back to the beginning and read it again.

Twice was enough.

It was easily the BEST BOOK I'll never read again!

While very entertaining, it is deep...more

5 likes · like · see review

Mar 07, 2012 Amanda rated it 4 of 5 stars

"Surface, surface, surface was all that anyone found meaning in."
There is a reason why this book is considered a classic in American literature. If you can look past the brutal bloodshed, the mundane conversations between Bateman and his acquaintances, and the rather grotesque sexual scenes, you will understand why this book is so great.

It depicts the depths of a human that is deep into the world of materialism and having the best of the best; yet is also capable of doing some appallingly sick...more

2 likes · like · see review

« previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 … 99 100 next »

new topic
Discuss This Book

topics	posts	views	last activity
Fiction Fanatics: March 2013 - American Psycho	23	46	Apr 08, 2013 03:44pm
Other books by Bret Ellis	16	98	Mar 18, 2013 09:34pm
Bateman's violence: All in his head?	45	439	Mar 09, 2013 08:19am
Does it get better?	72	345	Mar 03, 2013 07:22pm
Reflections Book ...: American Psycho	1	3	Feb 24, 2013 11:20am
The Mystery, Crim...: The Canyons	1	9	Feb 23, 2013 08:30pm

combine
Other Editions (77)

More editions...

Genres

Horror

722 users

Thriller

223 users

Contemporary

176 users

Mystery > Crime

167 users

Classics

141 users

Literature

134 users

Novels

117 users

Literature > American

102 users

Mystery

60 users

Adult Fiction

54 users

See top shelves...

Readers also enjoyed similar books

Requiem for a Dream
by Hubert Selby Jr.
Crash
by J.G. Ballard
Trainspotting
by Irvine Welsh
The Basketball Diaries
by Jim Carroll
Bright Lights, Big City
by Jay McInerney

About Bret Easton Ellis

Bret Easton Ellis is an American author. He is considered to be one of the major Generation X authors and was regarded as one of the so-called literary Brat Pack, which also included Tama Janowitz and Jay McInerney. He has called himself a moralist, although he has often been pegged as a nihilist. His characters are young, generally vacuous people, who are aware of their depravity but choose to en...more

More about Bret Easton Ellis...

Books by Bret Easton Ellis

More…

Share This Book

Facebook Twitter Your website

Trivia About American Psycho

37 trivia questions
3 quizzes

More quizzes & trivia...

Quotes from American Psycho

“...there is an idea of a Patrick Bateman, some kind of abstraction, but there is no real me, only an entity, something illusory, and though I can hide my cold gaze and you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours and maybe you can even sense our lifestyles are probably comparable: I simply am not there.” — 261 people liked it

“I had all the characteristics of a human being—flesh, blood, skin, hair—but my depersonalization was so intense, had gone so deep, that my normal ability to feel compassion had been eradicated, the victim of a slow, purposeful erasure. I was simply imitating reality, a rough resemblance of a human being, with only a dim corner of my mind functioning” — 200 people liked it

More quotes…

title link	preview: American Psycho
avg rating	preview: American Psycho Goodreads rating: 3.78 (79794 ratings)
small image	preview: click here [close]
med image	preview: click here [close]
BBCode	[url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28676.American_Psycho?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1348400564l/28676.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28676.American_Psycho?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis[/url]

American Psycho

Friend Reviews

Community Reviews

Share This Book

Share This Book on Your Website