Entertainment For Lively Minds
Blood's A Rover
Posted by Carl Parker on 2 November 2009 - 7:59pm.
On tonight's Front Row on Radio 4, Mark Lawson interviewed James Ellroy about the final part of his conspiracies trilogy, Blood's A Rover.
He doesn't sound like an easy interviewee, but Lawson does a decent job. There was disagreement about the wrting style. Lawson thought the style was reminiscent of The Cold Six Thousand; short and punchy. Ellroy contradicted this saying this time they are longer. I hope that is the case as I found that short sentence style very wearing. However I've waited 8 years for this to come out, so I'm looking forward to reading it.
It will be available on Listen Again on the BBC for the next week. The interview starts aroun 15 minutes in.
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my worry is, "Is it too long between books?"
I enjoyed the first two books but it's over decade (nearer 15!) since I read the first and I'm not sure if you need to re-read to get up to speed. They were very intense and I don't know if I could face it.
I love the hepped up hipster writing style of the earlier books, I read the last one on holiday in France and it was hard to balance the book's intense world of dodgy politics, mercenaries and assassinations with the "real" world of water parks, oysters and other family fun.
I will probably get get the paperback next summer though.
Which is his best book do you think?
The LA Quartet
I loved the whole LA Quartet. It's hard to pick one of those out.
My favourite could be American Tabloid, but as with you its the best part of 15 years since I read it. I do know I read it on holiday and it was really intense.
I've read them all
up to the Cold Six Thousand, but just couldn't get into it. Maybe I'll give it another go. The LA Quartet are all superb in my humble.
The Cold Six Thousand...
...is worth another go. The sheer ambition, complexity and freneticism of this trilogy is so much 'bigger' than the earlier work. Not necessarily better, just on an more epic scale.
Like you I think the LA Quartet is excellent. I did chuckle when Spade Cooley - a recurring character in Ellroy's books - turned up on a Word CD with his Western Swing Orchestra a while ago. It seems that the real Cooley was convicted of the murder of his second wife. He beat her and 'stomped' on her body until she died. After eight years inside, he was granted a brief parole to play at a benefit gig for the Deputy Sheriffs Association of Alameda County in Oakland. After the show, he had a heart attack and died in the backstage area. A perfect Ellroy character!
The Big Nowhere
probably edges past American Tabloid and LA Confidential, but I did enjoy his earlier stuff (Brown's Requiem, Clandestine and
The Black Dahlia).
And (as much as I wanted to love it) another thumbs down to Cold Six Thousand - unreadable, sadly.
Thanks for the Radio 4 interview tip - will catch this later. I understand Ellroy is a uhm, complex kinda guy
I have Blood's a Rover...
... and have just re read American Tabloid. I've just started re-reading The Cold Six Thousand.
Ellroy might be my favorite living writer. He is someone who I think is worth sticking with. Even when he's less good, and The Cold Six Thousand is hard to love, he's consistently interesting and always entertaining.
Ellroy is worth about two dozen Sebastian Faulks's and would be a perfect Word from the Wise subject...
Great choice Word to the Wise
but I'd be staggered if it survived the censor. He's a complicated kinda guy, with extreme views (unsurprising, given his childhood).
Mr Ellen...
... listen to the wise words of gangle.
James Ellroy, a controversialist if ever there was one. He'll make good copy. It could be another Ginger Baker type scenario (but I doubt it), but I'm sure you can get some good copy out of him.
Long Term Ellroy Fan
Love , almost all,of his works and although the staccato writing style can be tiresome. Check out his "My Dark Places", a memoir of his own investigation into his mother´s death. Looking forward to Blood´s a Rover.