<He did it, as he told me years ago he would, by making
each succeeding book "bigger, denser, more complex, more
multilayered, more multiplotted, richer, darker, more
stylized, dare I say it, more profound.>>
No, more shallow. Excuse me, but mentioning Ellroy in the
same breath with James Joyce strikes me as a bad joke. Ellroy
is a good ultrahardboiled writer, but he doesn't have an
ounce of subtlety and his gallery of characters is remarkably
narrow. His action-writing is good, but his characterization
is very crude. After White Jazz, he abandoned one of the most
important tools for a musician or a writer, namely contrast.
Everything seems shouted, with no relief. The theme gets lost
in the noise.
I'm not handing in my card as an Ellroy admirer, but he's no
Joyce and, more to the point, he's not as good as the best
writers of hardboiled and noir fiction (Hammett, Chandler,
Willeford, Himes, with a big pack following some distance
back).
Regards,
MrT
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