The Rules of Attraction is a satirical black comedy novel by Bret Easton Ellis published …
Review of 'The Rules of Attraction' on 'Goodreads'
3 stars
New Hampshire. Against a background of social desolation and family dysfunction, we get the internal perspectives of a group of young adults - that manage to flunk courses for which the only real examination consists of being able to open a door.
Disdainfully they fuck left, right, and center, working through mountains of abusive substances.
No matter! They are masters of the universe offspring, and bound to form the next generation of a bored, nihilist elite, lacking even the remotest sense of entitlement.
Funny how these perspectives don’t even relate, even though they cover the same events. A mesh of misunderstanding rooted in total lack of empathy.
Until the end, that is; which, in my reading, is the end of the road (pun intended) for the apex asshole amongst this joyless band of little shits.
This is not BEE’s finest. It lacks the focus, the pain and the urgency of …
New Hampshire. Against a background of social desolation and family dysfunction, we get the internal perspectives of a group of young adults - that manage to flunk courses for which the only real examination consists of being able to open a door.
Disdainfully they fuck left, right, and center, working through mountains of abusive substances.
No matter! They are masters of the universe offspring, and bound to form the next generation of a bored, nihilist elite, lacking even the remotest sense of entitlement.
Funny how these perspectives don’t even relate, even though they cover the same events. A mesh of misunderstanding rooted in total lack of empathy.
Until the end, that is; which, in my reading, is the end of the road (pun intended) for the apex asshole amongst this joyless band of little shits.
This is not BEE’s finest. It lacks the focus, the pain and the urgency of the peaks of his oeuvre. I remember reading it, decades ago, and getting swept by the flow, the rhythm, of the narrative. I did not find that mood again.
Set in Los Angeles in the early 1980's, this coolly mesmerizing novel is a raw, …
Review of 'Less Than Zero (Picador Books)' on 'Goodreads'
5 stars
This I reread, after being swept by The Shards. It’s been a ling time.
What I remembered and experienced again: the desolation of the insanely rich narcist brats. The substance abuse. The emptiness, the pervasive, stiffling sense of boredom of those free to pursuit anything, no limits. Also: the glimpse of humanity.
I did not recall the viscersl cruelty that much. Even so, the language is mesmerizing, powerful.
Brideshead Revisited, but different. The inside of an ultra-spoiled brat, an adolescent putting on oversized britches while self-regulating anxiety and emotions by means of mountains of pills and other substances. The scene is known, a setting that immediately brings back not just Less than Zero but more importantly timewarps me back into the younger self reading it.
Which, I guess, would be the point of this autofiction. It holds up a mirror, but it’s a broken mirror giving a fragmented reflection. Not reality, but still revealing, truthful. Now I’ll reread that debut; the slight melancholy merits an extension.
"In this self-portrait by an American genius, Kurt Vonnegut writes with beguiling wit and poignant …
Review of 'Palm Sunday' on 'Goodreads'
5 stars
Every Vonnegut reread is a fresh and wholesome new read. I fully intend to keep rereading until I either drop dead or the inevitable chaos of utter boredom with life itself overcomes me.
Love (2003) is the eighth novel by Toni Morrison. Written in Morrison's non-linear style, the …
Review of 'Love' on 'Goodreads'
4 stars
Love, it said, and then a story of lives entangled in hate unfolded. So much of it that even a cathartic recovery still left the bitter atoma of hate permeating the air.