<![CDATA[The Cold Six Thousand]]>

false <![CDATA[The Cold Six Thousand]]> http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1165390582m/4191.jpg 4191 14 With its hypnotic, staccato rhythms, and words jostling, bumping, marching forward with edgy intensity (like lemmings heading toward a cliff of their own devising), The Cold Six Thousand feels as if it's being narrated by a hopped-up Dr. Seuss who's hungrier for violence than for green eggs and ham. In spinning the threads of post-JFK-assassination cultural chaos, James Ellroy's whirlwind riff on the 1960s takes nothing for granted, except that absolute power corrupts absolutely. Hurtling from Las Vegas to Vietnam to Cuba to Memphis and back again (and all points in between), from Dealey Plaza to opium fields to smoke-filled back rooms where the mob holds sway, the novel traces the strands of complicity, greed, and fear that connect three men to a legion of supporting characters: Ward Littell, a former Feeb whose current allegiance to the mob and to Howard Hughes can't mask his admiration for the Kennedy brothers and Martin Luther King; Pete Bondurant, a hit man and fervent anti-Communist who splits his time between Vegas casinos and CIA-sponsored heroin labs in Saigon; and Wayne Tedrow Jr., a young Vegas cop who's sent to Dallas in late November 1963 to snuff a black pimp, and who is fighting a losing battle against his predilection for violence: "Junior was a hider. Junior was a watcher. Junior lit flames. Junior torched. Junior lived in his head." And behind these three, J. Edgar Hoover is the master puppeteer, pulling strings with visionary zeal and resolute pragmatism, the still point around whom the novel roils and tumbles. At once evil and comic, Hoover predicts that LBJ "will deplete his prestige on the home front and recoup it in Vietnam. History will judge him as a tall man with big ears who needed wretched people to love him," and feels that Cuba "appeals to hotheads and the morally impaired. It's the cuisine and the sex. Plantains and women who have intercourse with donkeys." The Seussian comparison isn't that far-fetched: Ellroy's novel, like the children's books (and like the very decade it limns), is flexible, spontaneous, and unabashedly off-kilter. Weighing in at a hefty 700 pages, The Cold Six Thousand is a trifle bloated by the excesses of its narrative form. But what glorious excess it is, as Ellroy continues to illuminate the twin impulses toward idealism and corruption that frame American popular and political culture. He deftly puts unforgettable faces and voices to the murkiest of conspiracy theories, and simultaneously mocks our eager assumption that such knowledge will make a difference. --Kelly Flynn 22797 2001 The Cold Six Thousand total:761|5:224|4:278|3:195|2:48|1:16| 761 2929 1068 68 4 28 false false Fri Jul 17 23:47:25 -0700 2009 Sat Jul 18 11:54:01 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 3 false false Sat Sep 22 06:09:42 -0700 2007 Thu Sep 24 06:58:59 -0700 2009 3
American Tabloid is one of my all-time favorite books. The second part of the...more...]]> 5 4 false false Mon Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2002 Sun Aug 31 11:12:25 -0700 2008 Sun Aug 31 11:24:26 -0700 2008 more...]]> 0 2 false false Tue Sep 29 17:54:22 -0700 2009 Wed Sep 30 11:17:36 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 1 false false Wed Mar 01 00:00:00 -0800 2006 Mon Jul 30 01:24:53 -0700 2007 Sun Oct 14 15:22:06 -0700 2007 Cold picks up right where American Tabloid leaves off -- the Kennedy Assassination. All the same elements are in place -- the sleazy underworld who, in Ellory's world, are in charge of everything, the pulpy lowlifes, and caustically cynical worldview ...more...]]> 4 1 false false Tue Jul 10 07:07:28 -0700 2007 Tue Jul 10 07:15:22 -0700 2007 more...]]> 5 0 false false Wed Nov 04 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Tue Oct 27 07:46:00 -0700 2009 Thu Nov 05 07:55:51 -0800 2009 more...]]> 2 0 false false Thu Oct 15 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Thu Oct 15 12:58:28 -0700 2009 Sat Oct 31 20:01:17 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Wed Oct 28 15:46:43 -0700 2009 Tue Oct 20 12:19:30 -0700 2009 Fri Oct 23 18:42:05 -0700 2009 American Tabloid, argh, and started reading it before I realized it was the second in the series...I think I'm becoming a believer already; after intensely disliking the first few pages (is it just me or does Ellroy sound an awful lot like Henry Rol...more...]]> 5 0 false false Sat Nov 14 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Tue Sep 01 08:26:36 -0700 2009 Sat Nov 14 13:06:38 -0800 2009
Covering 1963 to 1968, a lot of interesting social and cultural events play into the novel's plotline, including Vietnam, the c...more...]]> 3 0 false false Fri Oct 17 10:22:45 -0700 2008 Fri Oct 17 10:25:22 -0700 2008 more...]]> 3 0 false false Thu Feb 05 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Tue Feb 19 20:26:52 -0800 2008 Sat Feb 07 13:32:59 -0800 2009 Vivid, propulsive, repellent.

I bought this sequel to Ellroy's American Tabloid when it was published in 2001, and decided I should read it again. Ellroy's saga of corruption and conspiracy in the sixties expands its canvas to include Vietnam, the civil rights movement, Howard Hughes' mov...more...]]> 5 5 false false Sun Apr 01 07:28:32 -0700 2007 Wed Sep 02 19:21:53 -0700 2009 2 American Tabloid ends with Pete Bourdant watching Barbara do a rendition of "Unchained Melody" in some Dallas lunchtime geek joint on a particularly historical November morning in 1963. The novel ends with Pete watching and waiting for the screams to start.

The Cold Six Thous...more...]]> 4 0 false true Thu Aug 27 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Thu May 17 17:15:02 -0700 2007 Sat Sep 19 14:13:26 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Thu Nov 20 16:02:33 -0800 2008 Thu Nov 20 16:06:11 -0800 2008 more...]]> 0 0 false false Thu Jan 01 10:16:29 -0800 2009 Thu Jan 01 10:20:03 -0800 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Wed Sep 30 07:41:38 -0700 2009 Wed Sep 30 07:45:00 -0700 2009
But this book, this book?

If you understand this then you understand the guts of America.

A difficult but rewarding read and even if his reading of kennedy's assassin...more...]]> 5 2 false false Thu Sep 03 04:51:26 -0700 2009 Mon Aug 10 23:00:46 -0700 2009 Thu Sep 03 04:51:26 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Sat Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Wed Sep 09 19:41:29 -0700 2009 Wed Sep 09 19:45:00 -0700 2009 4 0 false false Mon Sep 08 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Wed Oct 01 03:51:41 -0700 2008 Wed Oct 01 05:09:52 -0700 2008 more...]]> http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=4191