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112th out of 121 books
—
96 voters
The Hilliker Curse: My Pursuit of Women
by
James Ellroy
From “one of the great American writers of our time” (Los Angeles Times Book Review): a raw, explicit memoir as high-intensity and riveting as any of his novels.
The year was 1958. James Ellroy was ten years old. His mother, Jean Hilliker, had divorced her fast-buck hustler husband. She gave her son a choice: live with his father or her. He chose his father, and Jean—“half...more
The year was 1958. James Ellroy was ten years old. His mother, Jean Hilliker, had divorced her fast-buck hustler husband. She gave her son a choice: live with his father or her. He chose his father, and Jean—“half...more
Hardcover, 224 pages
Published
September 7th 2010
by Knopf
(first published 2008)
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1. once again i'll post the greatest picture in the history of all pictures.
myself. ellroy. manny.
2. the general busyness of my life these days doesn't allow much time to write book reports -- a shame because it's a terrific way to blow off steam. instead i drink. at kowalski's recommendation, i moved from bourbon on the rocks to gin & club soda. and it was a good move, a more appropriate summer drink. but i'm still wrecking my liver, prematurely aging, and require a quick mid-day nap to f...more
myself. ellroy. manny.
2. the general busyness of my life these days doesn't allow much time to write book reports -- a shame because it's a terrific way to blow off steam. instead i drink. at kowalski's recommendation, i moved from bourbon on the rocks to gin & club soda. and it was a good move, a more appropriate summer drink. but i'm still wrecking my liver, prematurely aging, and require a quick mid-day nap to f...more
Ellroy, I love your books, but I’m getting a little tired of hearing about your masturbation fantasies. *sigh*
OK, let’s take it from the top. Ladies and gentlemen, once again, the biography of James Ellroy:
James Ellroy was 10 in 1958 when his mother was raped and murdered. The case was never solved. His parents had been divorced, and he went to live with his father, a lazy two-bit hustler in L.A. Young James was socially awkward, had an overheated imagination and a child’s belief that he may ha...more
OK, let’s take it from the top. Ladies and gentlemen, once again, the biography of James Ellroy:
James Ellroy was 10 in 1958 when his mother was raped and murdered. The case was never solved. His parents had been divorced, and he went to live with his father, a lazy two-bit hustler in L.A. Young James was socially awkward, had an overheated imagination and a child’s belief that he may ha...more
This novel The Hilliker curse has alot to do with his association and his obsession with women.. One clear assumption from reading his words is he loves to brood and a bit too much. He's a one of a kind character, recently I watched an interview of his on video here and here it was outrageous. This gave me the need to start reading from this gifted writer, the Black Dahlia is the only novel I have read of his to date and have many of his novels on the shelf who's spines need breaking.
Since his...more
James Ellroy’s The Hilliker Curse crossbreeds the author’s harsh, weathered style with confessional self-loathing and fragile redemption. I visualize him in a tiny cell whispering the text through a screen to a priest.
If you’ve read Ellroy, (and if you haven’t read Ellroy don’t start with this one because you won’t get most of the literary and personal history references) especially My Dark Places, you might over the first ten pages think he’s cashing in with a quick and easy retread of his sord...more
If you’ve read Ellroy, (and if you haven’t read Ellroy don’t start with this one because you won’t get most of the literary and personal history references) especially My Dark Places, you might over the first ten pages think he’s cashing in with a quick and easy retread of his sord...more
Definitely one of the most self-indulgent books I've ever read. Ellroy comes across as a deluded ego monster, jerking off in the dark. And yet there was something revelatory about it all, so what if it's ridiculous, pathetic, and pretentious? Oh, and he's right-wing, and a sucker for woman-worship (when he's not stalking them). Gulp. The writing has muscle - at 62 Ellroy writes like a hipster on speedballs - and all of his skeevy confessions felt true, and defiant, and we should thank him for th...more
I'm willing to accept a great deal of psychotic egotism in an author and James Ellroy doesn't disappoint in his second memoir The Hilliker Curse. Though he offers plenty of wince-worthy self-aggrandizement in this book, he also offers a startlingly frank confession of both his perversions and his affections. Neither one is easy for a man to admit, let alone detail as Ellroy does here. However, I think this book's real value is as a journal of a great writer during a period of time that was both...more
In many ways this seemed to be a retread of My Dark Places, thought I read that so many years ago I could be wrong. A look inside the mind of a man who is constantly obsessed with women. I couldn't help but think that he must be exhausted (or very sleepy) from all the fantasizing and jacking off, though, on the page, he seems to maintain his energy. I suppose the nervous breakdown gives him some pause ... As always, I find his writing compulsively readable. I crashed through this in a little mor...more
I can't remember the first Ellroy book I read, but I do remember becoming immediately hooked by his style and characters and fascination with the dark side in general and that of L.A. in particular. I devoured roughly five or six of his books within a month and a half and couldn't get enough of the breathless pace. THEN I found a copy of My Dark Places and it was like, holy shit, here's where it all came from.
I found a remaindered copy of The Hilliker Curse at Powell's bookstore in Portland O...more
I found a remaindered copy of The Hilliker Curse at Powell's bookstore in Portland O...more
If James Ellroy isn't one of your favorite authors, and if you don't know who the Halliker in the title refers to, you probably won't like this book very much. If, on the other hand, you are among the legions of devoted Ellroy prose sniffers and know all too well exactly who Hilliker is, you will think this book is great literature. The Hilliker Curse is Ellroy's latest foray into the murky world of his tortured psyche. Written as a memoir, it recounts his real and imagined relationships with wo...more
I have decided that I enjoy Ellroy's non-fiction even more than I love his fiction. I have read his fiction for years and enjoyed it and certainly known that Ellroy peppers his fiction with real people who have made an impression on him through the years. I have to say I love most everything about him--he's a walking contradiction (something I understand well)--right wing, vulgar, self aware, cynical, romantic, too crazy to be sane and too sane to be crazy. And a man who writes about the murder...more
There are more than a few readers and critics panning The Hilliker Curse. Some believe Ellroy is covering old ground... his mother's murder and the subsequent effects on his psyche. Since ager ten, Ellroy has been trying to fill the maternal void. We've heard him tell the story a thousand times in numerous ways. We've seen the result... numerous novels that are some of the best American fiction ever composed... yes... composed... like Beethoven.
I'm confident someone else much better qualified th...more
I'm confident someone else much better qualified th...more
James Ellroy's crime and political fiction is by turns compelling, awe-inspiring and annoying as hell, so it stands to reason that his non-fiction should follow the same pattern. Ellroy's mother was murdered in Los Angeles when he was a young boy and he has carried feelings of guilt and responsibility throughout his whole life. These feelings imbue his fiction with desperate tales of passionate strong willed women and have also led him to search in real life for a woman to fit this model. This b...more
If you've read Ellroy's fiction and My Dark Places, then absolutely read this book. If you are short in one field or the other though, correct that before picking this up. Unlike My Dark Places, there's no mystery to drive the narrative, only the author's personal demons, and they're much better understood with the background of the author's earlier efforts to face them. In particular, he talks about how his life has played out since My Dark Places, while also discussion the books he wrote since...more
Another one of those "three and a half stars" books. I'm a fan of Ellroy and enjoyed the writing and "tidbits" about women. Length wise I couldn't see this book being any longer...I'm curious now to see about his current state with women since this book came out in 2010. The book itself was a "memoir" of sorts, it also at times read like a confessional, however, it never in my opinion veered into "poor me" territory or felt that Ellroy was just bitching about his life (granted he went through a...more
What a weird, mesmerizing headlong kiss-and-tell memoir. I'm a huge Ellroy fan, there was no way I was going to miss this one. I just wish he'd slow up a little. I feel as if I'm on a high-speed bus tour of Paris, and someone's pointing out the major sights as we whiz by them. Would like to get out and walk around a bit, buy a kir and sit at a sidewalk cafe, drink in the scene.
But fascinating to read what was going on in this man's life as he was writing the books. Although sometimes the voice...more
But fascinating to read what was going on in this man's life as he was writing the books. Although sometimes the voice...more
There are plenty of things to love about James Ellroy's mysteries--from intriguing yet morally questionable characters to the particular staccato character of his prose. Both are present in The Hilliker Curse, but critics were much less impressed with this memoir than with his fiction. Most felt his prose style confusing, particularly in cases where clarity would seem required. They also had trouble sympathizing with Ellroy's predations, even when he presented a reasonable explanation for his be...more
Great read! What starts as old guy looking back at his pervert teens and twenties (peeping tom/panty sniffing stuff) becomes a surprisingly revealing memoir of love and loss. Ellroy spends the majority of the book discussing his failed second marriage and subsequent failed relationship after that. Instead of a bitter diatribe about lost love, his chronicle of this period are love letters to women he still cares deeply about.
And those jazzy prose! The Demon Dog hasn't lost any of his bite:
"Para...more
And those jazzy prose! The Demon Dog hasn't lost any of his bite:
"Para...more
Well, I was hoping to get more of Ellroy's personal, post-childhood history, and this sure had some of it. I don't doubt that some people will come away from this convinced that Ellroy's manic obsession with Beethoven, women, and profanity qualify him as a AAA nut-job cum raging asshole. And that does appear to be the case, but he's still a monster of crime fiction whose works I will continue to seek out. Also didn't know that he had a complete and utter flip-out shortly after finishing The Cold...more
I don't altogether know why I even finished this. It's miles from being as well written and deep as Ellroy thinks it is, though I suppose I appreciate his willingness to dig deep and disclose candidly the ugliest things about himself. Yet by the end even that seemed rote and practised, the same way his jivin' hep-cat lingo had gone well-beyond tiresome by thirty or forty pages in. I understand he believes he's the finest writer living today, but I wish he imagined that a fine writer could vary t...more
I am not quite sure how I feel about Ellroy's latest venture. Though, I was affected by this memoir. At a young age, he began stalking women and continued to hone his talent to the current day. From breaking into homes, to obsessively looking for "The One", Hilliker is borderline psychotic in his pursuit of women. Most run from him, yet, a few are so completely enamored, they forget their own wedding vows to be with him. Maybe they are just attracted to the writer in him. Or, more disturbingly,...more
I confess to being a huge fan of Ellroy's work. I think his LA Quartet is a masterpiece of style and scope. I also enjoyed the later trilogy, even though his writing style has become more mannered and forced. That said, I found this memoir to be a really tough slog. Much has been written about his mother being murdered when Ellroy was a young boy, but to read Ellroy's recollection of it and his subsequent Oedipal pursuit of the perfect life companion, written in that staccato, alliterative, blud...more
Maybe it was inevitable, and maybe it has to do with the fact that Ellroy's latest offering takes a cringe-worthy turn into the ultra intimate tender moments of a man well over 40, but his statement oriented prose style feels repetitive at times and disjointed at others. Worth it for Ellroy fans particularly because it explains the genius of "The Cold Six Thousand" (he was whacked out on obsession, pills, and trying to avoid his wife) and why "Blood's a Rover" takes such a weird turn in the seri...more
A masterclass in mother issues and how to ruin relationships. This is the first James Ellroy I'd read and once I'd got used to the staccato writing style and gumshoe tone it was an enjoyable read by an author I had only a passing knowledge of.
Pleasant enough if not something that will remain memorable. I enjoyed the telling of at times an angst ridden selfish tale in a way that remained interesting without being irritating. I felt absolutely no connection to Ellroy himself in the memoir or to an...more
Pleasant enough if not something that will remain memorable. I enjoyed the telling of at times an angst ridden selfish tale in a way that remained interesting without being irritating. I felt absolutely no connection to Ellroy himself in the memoir or to an...more
It begins strongly, then something happens. Nail in the dirt.
Nothing changes. It keeps going. The curse, Ellroy's horrific family tragedy, is well known by now. We know that story. That story haunts this story. Exteriors don't exist here. It is all internal. The book circles round and round. Ellroy pursues women, through pain, through drugs and peeping, he keeps at it. The relentless pursuit is a kind of madness. The temper is ferocious. One woman, another woman. Marriage for years and years, a...more
Nothing changes. It keeps going. The curse, Ellroy's horrific family tragedy, is well known by now. We know that story. That story haunts this story. Exteriors don't exist here. It is all internal. The book circles round and round. Ellroy pursues women, through pain, through drugs and peeping, he keeps at it. The relentless pursuit is a kind of madness. The temper is ferocious. One woman, another woman. Marriage for years and years, a...more
I've always enjoyed the noir L.A.-based fiction of James Ellroy, and was eager to get into his new memoir. What a disappointment! This book is self-pitying and full of the sort of detail better reserved for the confessional. If you believe even half of what he has written, he's an ego-centric (much more so than most writers) misogynistic jerk.
Stick to your novels, Mr. Ellroy. Your life, as recorded by your own hand, is a sad joke.
Stick to your novels, Mr. Ellroy. Your life, as recorded by your own hand, is a sad joke.
Sorry, just couldn't stick with this self-narrated Ellroy screed. I know from having read all of his fiction and his prior non-fictional forays into his own biography that he was one sick puppy, obsessed with sex, drink & drugs, cops and peeping, terrified and obsessed simultaneously with women and his own guilt over the murder of his party girl mama. But still. No reason to drive around the streets of LA with him blaring out of my radio. What happened to his editors? Really unpleasant.
As compelling, blunt, noir, intelligent and creepy as his fiction. If you like that, don't miss this confessional autobiography about the women in his life, starting with his mother, murdered when he was a kid. This book explains a lot about Ellroy's fiction, especially its dark corners, although he's so dismissive of his last memoir (My Dark Places) that I'm left thinking that he left a lot untold here in an attempt to win over his audience in spite of his self-abasing egomania.
As you would expect from Ellroy, the prose has a spark and rhythm that pulls you through from start to finish at pace. It's more relaxed than The Cold Six Thousand, but then this is a memoir.
For those of you who want exacting details of events, from early childhood to the present day, you're going to be disappointed. Be sure, this is a thematic memoir that deals strictly with one aspect of Ellroy's life: women. Everything that else that has happened in his life, from his wayward beginnings to t...more
For those of you who want exacting details of events, from early childhood to the present day, you're going to be disappointed. Be sure, this is a thematic memoir that deals strictly with one aspect of Ellroy's life: women. Everything that else that has happened in his life, from his wayward beginnings to t...more
People always assume I like James Ellroy, because I’m a noir buff, have a lot of his books, and share to some extent his infatuation with Anne Sofie von Otter and pulp (while reading ‘The Hilliker Curse’, I found out that he is a fellow Spillane fan -though I think my appreciation is more tongue-in-cheek than his). The thing is, I read him mostly because Ellroy became a style benchmark for modern noir, but I must confess that his writing annoys me a bit, and what works reasonably well for crime...more
ellroy's greatest strength- the unrestrained fever pitch of his writing- i find sort of exhausting as a memoir. at least i did for my dark places. where the earlier memoir tiptoes around contemporary ellroy-behavior, however, this one lays bare all sorts of obsessive bad behavior, making for a far more harrowing and cathartic read. although it's kind of like being stuck at a dinner party with a loud and over-caffeinated uncle at times, its brevity and concision redeemed it for me.
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James Ellroy was born in Los Angeles in 1948. His L.A. Quartet novels—The Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, L.A. Confidential, and White Jazz—were international best sellers. His novel American Tabloid was Time magazine’s Best Book (fiction) of 1995; his memoir, My Dark Places, was a Time Best Book of the Year and a New York Times Notable Book for 1996. His novel The Cold Six Thousand was a New York...more
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“I learn things late-and only the hard way.”
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“I didn't care who we were. I required no consummation. I knew that whoever we were and whatever we had would never stop.”
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