book data
651 ratings, 3.91 average rating, 66 reviews
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published
1998
by Random House Value Publishing
binding
Hardcover
isbn
0517288990
(isbn13: 9780517288993)
description
James Ellroy's trademark is his language: it is sometimes caustically funny and always brazen. When he's hitting on all cylinders, as he is in My Dark Places,...more
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other reviews (showing 1-20 of 789)
Read in April, 2008
recommended to Jessica by:
most recently, cate peeblesrecommends it for: probably not to everyone
I love this goddamn book, and I love James Ellroy. Reading this made me remember why I liked his books so much when I read them years ago, but this is much better than his fiction. Still, I think having read some of his other stuff definitely helped me appreciate this more.
Ellroy really gets it. He gets so many things that most people don't: Ellroy gets misogyny. He gets bigotry and racism. Ellroy gets brutality and violence. He gets crime. He gets sexuality, he gets desire, he gets pain. He...more
Ellroy really gets it. He gets so many things that most people don't: Ellroy gets misogyny. He gets bigotry and racism. Ellroy gets brutality and violence. He gets crime. He gets sexuality, he gets desire, he gets pain. He...more
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18 comments
Having suffered previous dissapointments with Ellroy's convoluted brand of fact inspired fiction, I was slightly apprehensive when I picked this one up. However it's biographical status, hinged with its unflinching honesty and clipped, poetically charged sentences makes this an excellent read.
Ellroy's work has often been described as 'psycho-sexual', and indeed with novels such as 'The Black Dahlia' sexual urges - repressed or expressed, deviant or otherwise - cast long shadows across his su...more
Ellroy's work has often been described as 'psycho-sexual', and indeed with novels such as 'The Black Dahlia' sexual urges - repressed or expressed, deviant or otherwise - cast long shadows across his su...more
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Read in May, 2008
Ellroy is best known for his crime novel The Black Dahlia and the noir bestseller L.A. Confidential. In this disturbing memoir, he turns his crime fixation on himself and explains why he is the way he is: completely screwed up. Ellroy’s mother Geneva (Jean) Hilliker was strangled to death, possibly raped, and dumped on the side of the road when Ellroy was ten. The first 100 pages of this book is a detailed (and graphic) examination of the unsolved murder – who she was last seen with, who the...more
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Let me start this by saying that although I loved this book, I am NOT a fan of James Ellroy. He is sick and whacked out and annoying, and not only does he know it but I'm pretty sure he is real proud of it. My buddy and I saw him introduce a bio-pic on himself in L.A. and we talked about jumping him. We were almost half-serious. I think the guy just has an ability to inspire tremendous aggression and disgust in folks.
I've tried to read his fiction books numerous times and can never make ...more
I've tried to read his fiction books numerous times and can never make ...more
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Is it possible for a book to be too dark, to sick, too disturbing, even for me? The answer, apparently, is yes.
This book is certainly compelling, in the manner of car crashes and cripples; once you start looking, you will have trouble looking away despite your best efforts. And it is a fascinating story. But man, James Ellroy is a sick fuck. It's not clear to me how much of this is real and how much is fiction (although it's billed as non=fiction, Ellroy is, after all, a novelist). Bu...more
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"My Dark Places" is a somewhat typical Ellroy hard-boiled noir melded with about as personal a memoir as you're likely to find. Exploring the unsolved murder of his own mother, Ellroy examines the case, from the act itself to the initial investigation to his own prying decades later, veering from the strictly clinical to the deeply personal as each chapter examines the crime and its aftermath from a unique viewpoint. Ellroy seems keenly aware of both the futility of his reopen...more
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Read in July, 2007
recommends it for:
mystery/true crime/autobiography fans
James Ellroy was 10-years-old when his mother was murdered. Ever since then, he has been obsessed with crime. This autobiography is his attempt to reconcile himself with his mother's murder and to understand the woman she really was. Part I reads like a police procedural manual in which he keeps doing things like referring to his mother as a red-head. One review refers to this book as an "Oedipal Noir" and if you read, you'll see why. Part II talks about his descent into crime as a you...more
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Read in June, 2008
Wow. I wish I would have read this book when I was on my Ellroy jag a few years ago.
The midsection of the book consists of an autobiographical account of Ellroy's turbid early years and totally blew my mind. From stealing steaks to living in parks and drinking Thunderbird to binging on cough syrup and nearly losing his mind, this guy went through some seriously hard times. It's amazing that after years of homelessness and drug and alcohol abuse his mind is still acute enough to produce su...more
The midsection of the book consists of an autobiographical account of Ellroy's turbid early years and totally blew my mind. From stealing steaks to living in parks and drinking Thunderbird to binging on cough syrup and nearly losing his mind, this guy went through some seriously hard times. It's amazing that after years of homelessness and drug and alcohol abuse his mind is still acute enough to produce su...more
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Read in June, 1999
Now this book is great. Ellroy tells of his transformation from loser to writer and the life events that shaped him. As I said, I was never into the Black Dahlia case, but he obssesed over it. Partially because of he parallels to his own mother's unsolved murder. Some of the stories of him and his deadbeat father made me laugh out loud. Ellroy became an advocate of Nazism in his predominently Jewish middle school. No because he actually believed in it, but because he was just trying to be an as...more
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Read in January, 1998
Everytime I see anything about James Ellroy, I think about this book and how it is so much better than any of the fiction he writes. He has a truly unique style that pulls no punches. He will literally make you flinch with his extremely graphic, but distant, descriptions. Seriously-a teenager's battle with adolescence (drugs, sex, and zits) has never been so vivid.
All that said, the story is also very interesting. It is basically the story of his love of L.A. and crime starting with hi...more
All that said, the story is also very interesting. It is basically the story of his love of L.A. and crime starting with hi...more
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Read in January, 2008
James Ellroy's mother was slaughtered ala The Black Dahlia in the desert west area of the San Fernando Valley when he was but a child. This heartwrenching account of the impact his mother's murder and subsequent denial of the magnitude of it on his twisted soul is mesmerizing.
The parts wherein he finally opens up about his fabled but seldom chronicled years living on golf courses in Los Angeles and getting high By Any Means Necessary for year after year are as mordantly strange as anything h...more
The parts wherein he finally opens up about his fabled but seldom chronicled years living on golf courses in Los Angeles and getting high By Any Means Necessary for year after year are as mordantly strange as anything h...more
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Read in August, 2006
While I've been reading In Cold Blood, I've been reminiscing about all of the lovely spine-chillin' moider books I've read before. I got a signed copy of this for 3 dollars when I was on holidays. It may have been more of a 4-star book. I gave it 3 to be safe. The coldness of this account of his mother's murder is really striking. Also, the revelation that detectives often fall in love with the victims whose deaths they're investigating - particularly worrying when you think that they've seen th...more
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This book will captivate you and, ultimately, break your heart. Ellroy fires alliterations at you non-stop, as he tells the story in the 3rd person about his own mother's mysterious murder, and his ultimate and electrifying search for her murderer, once becoming a very disaffected adult. The writing is so bare here that you almost find yourself wanting to look away, even as you read-his very soul is in plain view. His fact-telling is unadorned, and yet he never allows it to get in the way of thi...more
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Read in January, 2000
Better than his novels look to be, but then i usually lean towards memoir. Very interesting autobiography of how the murder of his mother in childhood shaped his ongoing career obsession with other unsolved murders. Some historical accounts of Los Angeles in the 1950's, as well as the history of "body dumping sites" all over the greater L.A. area, and the way that those seeking to solve unsolved mysteries often themselves fall in love with the victims post mortem.
Very interesting, d
Very interesting, d
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Read in May, 2008
recommends it for:
anyone who loves true crime stories
This searing book is a most unusual hybrid of true crime investigation, gritty biography, twisted love story and brutal confessional. It is a very introspective and deeply effecting read. James Ellroy has a very distinct voice and compelling writing style that reads with the rat-a-tat zing of machine gun fire. This book is not for the faint of heart, but it is an unforgettable walk on the dark side as James Ellroy sets out to reclaim his mother decades after her death.
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Read in June, 2008
recommends it for:
People who like learning about crime, and who like mystery.
This book is definately not my usual taste, in fact I don't really recall what even inspired me to read it. Ellroy does a genius job, and is very open and honest, in this biography. His life was very intense, and not only because his mother was a murder victim. I think that he is a very talented and skilled writer, I am just not a big fan of this type of writing, as well as topic. However, I did find it very interesting at times, as well as educating at others.
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Read in September, 2007
recommends it for:
true crime
This is the first book I've read by James Ellroy and I was mightily impressed. He appears to be completely honest about who he was and what he was going through during this childhood and early adulthood. His mother was found murdered on the side of road when James is 10 and spending the weekend with his father. It certainly helps to explain his obession with that time period and true crime topics. I'm adding his Black Dahlia book to my reading list.
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Read in January, 1998
recommends it for:
Everyone
I love James Ellroy because he is so tough, so resilient, and has such a tender heart. The legatee of the hardboiled L.A. dicks of pulp fiction, Ellroy's true life story is not hardboiled, but hardbitten. The murder of his mother when he was a child, his fascination with the Black Dahlia case, his knockabout childhood, all contribute to making him the fine writer he is today. Writing saved his life, and his writing has haunted mine.
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Has a copy to sell/swap
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Read in October, 2008
This one wins most of its points for it's combination of memoir and noir style, and the rest of its points for brutal honesty. Ellroy gives us a really interesting look into his psyche (hint: paging Dr's Freud and Oedipus) while searching for answers regarding his mother's murder 35 years prior. He ends up finding some answers more interesting than whodunnit.
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Read in June, 2004
recommends it for:
true crime/ unsolved mystery fans
You know going into this it is about an unsolved murder, and the way Ellroy finds peace with it is a bit of a revelation. I read this before reading "The Black Dahlia Avenger" by Steve Hodel, part of the attraction to that book was, in the forward, Ellroy stated he believed Hodel solved his mothers' murder. Worth following this book with that one for true crime buffs.
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non-fiction (on 15 people's shelves)
true-crime (on 15 people's shelves)
memoir (on 13 people's shelves)
nonfiction (on 9 people's shelves)
crime (on 9 people's shelves)
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