Love Me Fierce In Danger: The Life of James Ellroy

by Steven Powell

WINNER OF 2024 EDGAR ALLAN POE AWARD (BEST CRITICAL/BIOGRAPHICAL BOOK)
THE TELEGRAPH'S BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR
SHORTLISTED FOR THE H.R.F KEATING AWARD FOR BEST BIOGRAPHICAL/CRITICAL BOOK

"As gripping and twisted as a James Ellroy novel." - Ian Rankin

"A masterpiece of literary biography." - David Peace

The first critical biography of a titan of American crime fiction.

Love Me Fierce In Danger is the story of James Ellroy, one of the most provocative and singular figures in American literature. The so-called “Demon Dog of Crime Fiction,” Ellroy enjoys a celebrity status and notoriety that few authors can match. However, traumas from the past have shadowed his literary success.

When Ellroy was ten years old, his mother was brutally murdered. The crime went unsolved, and her death marked the start of a long and turbulent road for Ellroy that has included struggles with alcoholism, drug addiction, homelessness, and jail time. In tracing his life and career, Steven Powell reveals how Ellroy's upbringing in LA, always on the periphery of Hollywood, had a profound and dark influence on his work as a novelist. Using new sources, Powell also uncovers Ellroy's family secrets, including the mysterious first marriage of his mother Jean Ellroy, eighteen years before her murder. At its heart, Love Me Fierce in Danger is the story of how Ellroy overcame his demons to become the bestselling and celebrated author of such classics as The Black Dahlia and LA Confidential.

Informed by interviews with friends, family, peers, and literary and Hollywood collaborators, as well as extensive conversations with Ellroy himself, Love Me Fierce In Danger pulls back the curtain on an enigmatic figure who has courted acclaim and controversy with equal zealotry.

Genres: Nonfiction, Biography, Crime

353 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 12, 2023

Reviews

[Michelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love Me Fierce in Danger: The Life of James Ellroy – Steven Powell – 2023
This is the first significant biography of James Ellroy’s legendary literary career, that accelerated after his historical crime fiction novels rocked the NYT bestseller lists. During his long career, Ellroy has won numerous awards and found additional success with articles and essays, noir screen and script writing, crime documentaries, memoir and public speaking engagements. These are incredible achievements for a man that credits his educational background to the Los Angeles County Public Library after his expulsion from high school. Since 2020, author Steven Powell, based in the U.K. has invested hundreds of hours in research and directly conversing with James Ellroy and Helen Knode. This is the fourth book Powell has written about Ellroy’s life and career.

Without question, the tragedy of Jean Ellroy’s unsolved murder in El Monte, California, (1948) has greatly influenced her son’s life and literary career beyond comprehension. There was bias and stigma in that era against divorced single mothers who didn’t meet the powerful idealized societal version of wife, mother, homemaker. There was no evidence that Jean, a nurse, was an alcoholic, promiscuous, or a bad unfit parent. She closely supervised her son’s education, took him to church services and on vacations. We learned that following their acrimonious divorce, his father deliberately poisoned his son's mind against his mother-- parental alienation was unheard of at the time.
In the 1970’s, homelessness, arrests/petty crimes and inhalant and alcohol abuse had taken a toll on Ellroy’s mental and physical health. As he turned his life around, he began writing. Ellroy sharpened his public speaking skills and dazzled AA members with his gifted storytelling abilities.
Powell introduced his favorite Ellroy novels and book series offering detailed accounts related to his writing styles of combining fictional characterization with real life events, and his technique of limiting dialogue to reduce the manuscript content. If a name was dropped, a credible story followed—also included were easy to follow timelines, cultural events, trips abroad, literary agents, famous editors, celebrities and other insiders in the publishing and film industries. Ellroy generously donated his papers to the University of South Carolina (1999) he visits on occasion to lecture and update the archive.
Eventually Ellroy identified as the “Demon Dog” of American crime fiction, and even barked sometimes in public spaces! Since barking dogs can be totally annoying, some fans (and former lovers) understandably failed to find this persona very amusing. Speaking of dogs, by his own admission, Ellroy’s dog Margaret did not like him and often growled in his presence. The dog was a gift from his second wife, editor/novelist Helen Knode (m.1991-2006).

The term of a “Ladies Man” implies a gentlemanly (true) love of women. Although Ellroy admired the fine women he romanced he was unable to honor his marriage vows or commitments in serious relationships. Throughout the book, he cycled through a repetitive pattern of obsessive ritualized seductions and abandonments that involved too many women. These women believed his lies layered in literary and poetic nonsense, accepted flowers, expensive costly gifts and (sometimes) insincere marriage proposals. He was introduced to families, friends and associates. Some of these women nursed him though health and emotional episodes, drug dependency, rehab programs, and mental breakdowns. Predictably, after he decided to move on, a vicious verbal fight was instigated, then he failed to answer or return phone calls. A former partner was conveniently dismissed: “We will never speak again.” he said. This is not love. The book is an exceptional exploration of scholarship and (unpleasant) truth. Nice photos were included. Bravo! ** With thanks to Bloomsbury via NetGalley for the DDC for the purpose of review.

[Andrew Nette · Rating 4 out of 5]

Love him or loathe him, it is impossible to ignore James Ellroy’s impact on crime fiction. Love Me Fierce in Danger: The Life of James Ellroy, by Steven Powell, makes a good case for the historical significance of his influence, not just on the crime genre but literature more generally. The first biography of one of America’s most controversial contemporary crime writers, researched and written with his full cooperation, Love Me Fierce in Danger also contributes a wealth of material and insight into Ellroy’s private life and personal struggles. I am tempted to say that it includes far more detail than I wanted to know. But that that would be a complete lie. I wanted to know it all, as I am damn sure many of you do, too.

Love Me Fierce In Danger is a substantial work of literary scholarship. Powell, who has written two previous critical works on Ellroy, interrogates in detail what has effectively been the three writing careers of Ellroy: his published fiction and non-fiction books, his script writing work for Hollywood – which is far more substantial than I had realised – and his work as a columnist for GQ magazine in the 1990s, which in itself was quite significant.

The exploration of Ellroy’s career is supplemented by detail and insight into Ellroy the person, based on conversations with the man himself, and friends and colleagues. And because Ellroy is a bullshit artist par excellence, and it has been hard in the past to take anything he says at face value, it is great to have the detail of his life so rigorously backgrounded and fact checked.

It is all here: the lives of his parents, including the Hollywood activities of Ellroy’s bottom feeding father, Armand, who if he did not sleep Rita Hayworth, as he was want to claim, certainly had a professional engagement of sorts with her; the full extent of Ellroy’s criminal life in 1960s Los Angeles, when he was mostly homeless and have major problems with drugs and alcohol; and his personal and sex life, including his pursuit and treatment of women which, by his own admission, sometimes borders on harassment (even if many of the women concerned still remember him fondly).

You should read the book and form your own opinion. For me, the picture of Ellroy that emerges from the pages of Love Me Fierce in Danger is of an enormously talented and driven writer, with a massive capacity for work, which at one point resulted in a nervous breakdown. In no way to take away from this, Ellroy also received far more chances to make it than many early career writers do in the current publishing environment have. A particular constellation of factors in publishing and movie making in the 1980s and 1990s, favoured Ellroy and he took full advantage of them. Ellroy has many positive personal characteristics. He can also be cruel, rude, petty, egotistical, and mercenary. His politics veer right. His racial politics are pretty suss and reading between the lines it seems fairly likely that Ellroy voted for Trump in 2016 (although later disavowed him).

Unfairly perhaps, for me the only insight lacking from Love Me Fierce in Danger is why Ellroy chose to go full steam ahead with the public disclosure on his life now. Did he just feel the time was right or is there another agenda at play? Because, as the book makes clear, Ellroy hardly ever does something without a long term strategy. I would also have liked to see Powell devote more space in the book to what I think is one of the most important debates arising out of Ellroy’s work, the question of verisimilitude in historical crime fiction.

Powell neither condemns nor justifies Ellroy’s faults, but rightly sees his job as being to provide as full a purview of Ellroy the writer and person as possible. As Joe Friday said in Dragnet, “Just the facts ma’am”. It doesn’t really matter because, even if it was Powell’s intention to be critical, Ellroy is simply too big and too influential to cancel. The reality is that The Black Dahlia, LA Confidential and American Tabloid blew a giant hole in the middle of what we all thought crime fiction could be, a hole through which many writers are still scrambling today. Love Me Fierce in Danger is a must read for fans and scholars of contemporary American crime fiction. If you need any further convincing, I did a lengthy interview with Powell for the US site CrimeReads, which you can read in full here.

Really interesting biography. I did an interview the author Steven Powell on CrimeReads, which you can find in full here my link text

[Alex Sarll]

Perilously close to that kid in the Whit Stillman film, reading a biography of a writer when you've only read two of the writer's books. But I'd heard this was quite a ride, and it doesn't disappoint. Obviously anyone with any awareness of Ellroy knows about his murdered mother, the similarities with the Black Dahlia case which set his trajectory from an early age, but his dad was just as much a character from the son's books, a foul-mouthed chancer so given to bullshitting that of course Ellroy came to disbelieve his stories of having been a war hero, and Rita Hayworth's business manager, even though both of those turn out to have been true. Given that background, little wonder if Ellroy's own life would take him to some dark places, though there's a heartbreaking early moment where his dad, in one of the few moments of vaguely responsible parenting here, has to tear out certain pages from the animal stories the young James* loves, lest they prove too distressing for the boy's tender sensibilities. Still, in Ellroy's world innocence never lasts long, and soon enough he's the school Nazi, a development to which his dad does respond pretty well, by beginning to wear a yarmulke around the house. Before long, the dad is dead too, his last words to his son the advice "Try to pick up every waitress who serves you." One day, that grounding in knowing there are sleazy stories behind Hollywood's veneer will serve Ellroy well, but in the meantime there's a hand-to-mouth youth of substance abuse and mostly petty but often quite disturbing crime to be getting on with – the sort of thing which could very easily have seen Ellroy too end up like one of his characters, except that we wouldn't have known what an Ellroy character was, because he'd have been dead in a ditch before he wrote a damn thing.

As it happens, he does eventually get clean – at least as far as booze is concerned. Which largely seems to leave him with more time and energy for chasing women instead, not least because at this point AA meetings were apparently hotbeds of hooking up. Though also of the usual cultish behaviour – even as someone who's always been deeply suspicious of the organisation, I was taken aback by the sponsor who insisted that Ellroy ditch writing because it was distracting him from the all-important steps. Yeah, because making sure to remove other sources of meaning from an addict's life will definitely help them stay sober, and doesn't at all feel just like a determination to monopolise their life. Not that Ellroy is exactly innocent on that front himself; initially a charmer with women, over and over again he rapidly becomes controlling, hypocritical, a general nasty piece of work, even before you consider the way he keeps talking about marriage far too soon – in one case, setting the date for less than a month after the preceding divorce. Not that it takes an expert to work out what might be at the root of this behaviour, even before he falls for an actress he also wants to cast as his mother in an adaptation of his memoir. Another recurring pattern is for Ellroy, who if he'd at least pulled back from outright fascism remained performatively right-wing (he named a dog after Margaret Thatcher), to fall for left-wingers. I think the ex who surprised me most was Ellen Kushner, known for her queer fantasy novels, but Powell has spoken to plenty, most of whom speak surprisingly fondly of Ellroy, considering**.

Not that the only famous names here are temporary targets of the Demon Dog's libido, mind. Some of the other characters are much as you'd expect, as in the dick-waving dinner with Harlan Ellison, or the angry encounter with Derek Raymond. Even Nick Cave has enough of an overlap in subject matter not to be surprising, ditto Charles Bronson – though the context there was not what I'd have guessed, and his methods of vengeance were considerably more subtle than his acting roles might lead you to expect. But we also get everyone from Samuel Delany to Carrie Fisher, and even an indirect role for Janet Malcolm. And while he's far from the most famous name, I was particularly entertained by the appearance of Matthew J. Bruccoli, a man whose F. Scott Fitzgerald obsession was the source of some fascination to a friend and me for a few years. Here he's described as "the most misogynistic man I ever met" by Ellroy, which is quite something from a man where one of his many break-ups came when his then partner failed to see the funny side after he "joked about using the names of his ex-girlfriends as dead hookers in his novels" (and can you guess what happened in the book he published after their split?). Still, you can't deny Ellroy called it right when he described Kevin Spacey as "a venomous individual" after their paths crossed on account of the LA Confidential film. The rest of the book has a thread running through it of his mixed feelings about this most successful screen version of his work, which kicked his career up a level even as it botched his book – despite which, he remained for a long time interested in the prospect of a sequel, and the version which would have seen the returning Guy Pearce and Russell Crowe joined by Chadwick Boseman definitely sounds like it would be worth a look at the DVD rental shop between the worlds. And if nothing else, even the film we got stands out as a better idea than most of Ellroy's other screen incarnations – the true crime film made by Troma sounds especially misjudged.

In amongst the grime and the glitz, of course, there's also the work – and Ellroy has always very much seen the novels as the real work, with screenwriting a lucrative adjunct. They're all here, although for certain selected examples the story stops in order that Powell can give a more detailed examination. His position is uncontroversial; the early books are apprentice work, leading up to the imposing LA Quartet, which is then followed by the Underworld USA trilogy, at which point Ellroy is clearly still trying to stretch himself as a writer, but in which that ambition can sometimes get away from him. And thereafter, a certain weariness creeps in, with the suspicion that the new prequel quartet might represent a surrender of sorts. Especially when you consider that the young Ellroy had planned to work until he could do the Black Dahlia case justice, then leave crime behind for historical fiction. Which...well, I suppose you could argue that he moved into historical fiction, it was just that he couldn't deliver on the other half because he'd realised American history was crime. And from the small portion of the work I know, I'd say this biography makes sense as something to sit beside it. Yeah, there were things where I would have liked to know more – hearing that Ellroy bonded with his long-time cover designer Chip Kidd over DC obscurity Snapper Carr, I would have loved a deeper dive on his comics tastes. And I did spot at least one error, in the references to "A.E. Houseman". But the overall impression is of a story told with sufficient craft and energy to overcome any sense that you wouldn't want to spend much time with the lead character, and from which you definitely feel like you've learned something about the USA. Hell, maybe Ellroy did end up a lot like one of his own characters after all.

*Actually Lee at this point, but let's not confuse matters.
**Weirdly, there is one whom Powell very carefully avoids naming, even while providing more than enough information to identify her, so I'm not sure what's going on there.

(Netgalley ARC)

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

To paraphrase from Steven Powell's introduction to this well-researched, comprehensive and at times overwhelming biography of legendary crime.novelist James Ellroy, it's surprising no one had already written such a book. Perhaps would-be biographers felt Ellroy had already told his own story well enough in his two memoirs, MY DARK PLACES (one of the "Demon Dog's" best works) and THE HILLIKER CURSE (one of his few utterly terrible books).

In any event, Powell had no such reticence, and his dedication has produced LOVE ME FIERCE IN DANGER. The book is drawn from years of research, which ranged from multiple interviews with Ellroy and his life's major figures to discoveries about the writer's family history Ellroy never could have made. This meticulous approach gives us a sweeping narrative that starts with Ellroy's parents' backgrounds in the 1920s and ends in 2021 with the 70-something writer in comfort and relative stability.

In between is a life of nearly nonstop chaos. Ellroy nearly died multiple times of alcohol and drug abuse before publishing a single book, let alone become the massively influential and successful giant of the genre he is now. Most of his fans already know this, as well as the story of his mother's murder, as it's all in MY DARK PLACES. Powell's work digs deeper into that material, but it doesn't feel like rehashing.

The truly revelatory stuff is found in the examination of Ellroy's years of fame. Though often staying sober after his hellish youth, his addictive personality manifests throughout his life in virtually every other aspect of it: spending, womanizing, chasing the trappings of fame in the media and at public appearances, and constantly aiming to portray himself as more.vulgar, caustic, right-wing and hypermasculine than he actually is (and he is in fact all of those things, but more nuanced underneath the bluster). Powell vows in the intro not to psychoanalyze Ellroy, but he doesn't have to: the behavior, whether it be acts of immense generosity and human kindness or cutthroat cruelty and verbal abuse, tells you all you need to know. Ellroy is an absolute mess in many ways, and it is inextricable from the power of his writing. (Ellroy is fairly honest to his biographer about most of his worst qualities; Powell presents the rest by amassing evidence from other parties.)

As I said in my review of Ellroy's latest novel (the disappointing, overcooked but compulsively readable WIDESPREAD PANIC), I'm a huge fan of his work. His fiction reveals more of who he is than almost any of his public statements. Powell understands this, and the time he spends critically examining Ellroy's major books is some of the biography's best material. (The look into the UNDERWORLD USA books is particularly insightful.)

All told, LOVE ME FIERCE IN DANGER is an engaging, well-paced read, one that Ellroy's fans, skeptics and neutral parties could all benefit from. (Though if you're the type of fan who needs to think their favorite writers are particularly great human beings, the examinations of Ellroy's behavior in romantic relationships will be excruciating.) If there is any area where the book is lacking, it's the abrupt ending. Just as we're delving into an interesting look at how and why Ellroy's work is (mostly) not losing quality but allowing structure and formal experimentation to subsume emotional engagement, everything just kind of stops, Barring a few anecdotes and the explanation of how Powell pitched his biography to Ellroy, that's it. Then again, it's perhaps truest to Ellroy's oft-cited statement that "closure is bullshit" for the book to end that way.

[Keith Chawgo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Steven Powell’s in-depth biography of the crime fiction writer James Ellroy which is very well constructed and extremely meaty. He is able to dive down deep into Ellroy’s life from birth to where he is today, which includes the death of his mother, life with his father afterwards and the questionable living life in the streets and his trouble with crime before settling down to become the writer he is today.

The beginning is very harrowing and very frank and honest which I truly applaud it for. This is warts and all and does not shy away from some very difficult subject matter that is his life but as we move forward to his writing career we are probably getting the most in-depth character study about the man and his gift to the world.

This is an excellent book and really hard to put into words a life that seems to outweigh the intense crime fiction that Ellroy produces. His life in itself is his best seller. Fascinating.

[Jason Allison · Rating 5 out of 5]

Starts a bit slow, but takes off and blitzes the reader with more inside publishing dirt and Ellroy arcana than I could have hoped for. Powell’s best—and perhaps only—critical examination of Ellroy’s writing focuses on his stylistic and thematic journey from Tabloid to Blood’s a Rover. The book’s at its best in those passages.

So many names. So many years. So many great novels. What a life.

[Bob Wake · Rating 4 out of 5]

Because James Ellroy is a writer of such pitiless self-exposure, Steven Powell’s biography of Ellroy is somewhat at a disadvantage. There are few dark corners in the life of the “demon dog of American crime fiction” that the demon dog himself hasn’t already talked about or written about. While Powell doesn’t skimp on the sensationalism, the biography is at its best in exploring the development of Ellroy’s distinctive brutalist prose style.

[Bill reilly · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having recently read LAPD 1953, a true crime book written by James Ellroy, I came across this biography by the British journalist, Steven Powell. Much of the material was previously covered in Ellroy's page-turning memoirs, My Dark Places and The Hilliker Curse. The death of the Black Dahlia, Elizabeth Short, in 1947, was followed up eleven years later by the murder of Ellroy's mother Jean Hilliker. Both were victim's of violent attacks and neither has been solved.
Ellroy spent the first thirty years of his life in a drug and alcohol haze, with several stints at various prisons for theft. While working as a caddy at a Westchester County golf course, the self-proclaimed future literary genius wrote his first novel in long hand.
After a few unsuccessful books, his crime novel, The Black Dahlia, made him famous and when LA Confidential was adapted for the big screen, the madman became rich and famous.
Women would come and go and occasional sobriety would follow. As of 2023, the two unsolved murders would remain so and Ellroy has remained a mysterious and fascinating human being.

[Steven Michael · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book excels as a narrative of James Ellroy's life. It fails, however, as a literary critique of his work. There's very little discussion about Ellroy's novels beyond brief synopsis. Instead it heavily focuses on Ellroy's childhood trauma and fraught relationships with women. This kind of begs the question: for whom was this written? Ellroy fans are probably already dialed into much of his biographical details, as Ellroy has published two autobiographies. If you're not an Ellroy fan, I don't know why you'd bother reading this.

[Thomas Trang · Rating 4 out of 5]

A rip-roaring look at the life and career of James Ellroy. It covers a lot of familiar ground but still manages to pull new insights about his childhood and early writing, and also adds some interesting context to his work and how it fits into the larger scope of American literature and Los Angeles.

The only real criticism-if you could call it that-would be that it ends rather abruptly. However, the story isn't finished yet.

[Jason Carter · Rating 5 out of 5]

This first ever full-length biography of James Ellroy is easily far more than just a simple rehashing of the Demon Dog’s well-documented life. Just as Ellroy himself has described Jack Webb’s The Badge as a type of Rosetta Stone for understanding the pathogenesis of Ellroy’s work, you can view Love Me Fierce in Danger the same way… In fact, the biography’s narrative thrust manages to accurately capture and reflect the many sides of its ornate and enthralling subject.
Like the Demon Dog himself, Love Me Fierce in Danger is by turns hilarious, shocking, compassionate, hopeful, uncompromising, optimistic, determined, and—ultimately successful at the ambitious task of detailing an equally ambitious and epic life.
Steven Powell also gives us candid and insightful analysis into the origins and progression of both Ellroy’s well-hashed outrageous public persona, and the Demon Dog’s monastically Beethovian private life, with all the idiosyncrasies, private insecurities, coping mechanisms, and solitary circumspection that bind these two extreme polarities for James Ellroy just like everyone else.
Love me Fierce in Danger is first a portrait of the artist as an energetic and trauma-tempered young dog, and then later—an elder hound both content with the considerable dent he’s made in the universe, and yet still today as a septuagenarian, not content to simply roll over…
For Ellroy fans and scholars both old and new, Love Me Fierce in Danger has plenty to spark and—more importantly—maintain your intrigue, even if you were certain you already knew all about James Ellroy’s exhaustively documented life…
I’m a perfect example of that: Despite being a rabid Ellroy fan and devotee since I was 14 years old (27 years ago…), and even after reading literally hundreds of Ellroy interviews and related media throughout that time, there were elements of Love Me Fierce in Danger that surprised even me… No spoilers here, but there’s even a highly symbolic scene involving the Demon Dog as a then-infantile Demon Puppy that serves as a foreshadowing of Ellroy’s evisceration—and thus, humanizing—of Hollywood’s numerous dirty secrets in the decades to come…
You can also see the painful reverberations—far into adulthood—of Ellroy’s childhood traumas, which certainly include, but also go far beyond the well-tread territory of his mother’s brutal 1958 murder. While you might expect some degree of this from any biography, with James Ellroy, it’s even more prescient, because the generational ramifications of past misdeeds is a deliberately haunting, discomforting, and necessary motif in all the Demon Dog’s novels.
With Love Me Fierce in Danger, Steven Powell—the foremost global expert on all things Ellroy—has given us an exhilarating examination of a complex and brilliant man scarred and then sculpted by tragedy, who has created his career—and indeed his whole adult life—with the same unrelenting pursuit Ellroy employs in skillfully weaving together his byzantine and symphonic fictional narratives… Indeed, as Steven Powell masterfully demonstrates, creation and performance are lifelong necessary tactics of survival for Ellroy.
Love Me Fierce in Danger is a volume that will be scrutinized and studied for decades to come, and as such is a perfect omniscient companion to Ellroy’s 1996 autobiography… and while in that book, Ellroy gave us a relentless Virgil-like tour of his dark places, Steven Powell’s Love Me Fierce in Danger is thus a welcoming and warming torch to illuminate the walls of the underworld with introspective shadows…
Love Me Fierce in Danger even respectfully acknowledges its subject’s lifelong fascination with mysticism, as the biography concludes on a mystical note evocative of a key piece of wisdom from Ellroy’s novel Blood’s A Rover: “Take note of what you are seeking, for it is seeking you…”

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

My thanks to both NetGalley and the publisher Bloomsbury Academic for an advanced copy of this biography on one of the outstanding and outlandish crime writers of the 20th Century.

To understand the art that is created, one must look at the past to find what created the person. What motivates, what irritates, what scares and what makes the creator laugh. A biographer might have to go deep, past where the creator wants others, including themselves to look, to even find facts about people close to the creator, that they didn't even know about. Actions, reactions, events all make a mark, all leave a scar. To understand the Demon Dog, one must know the hell that forged him. To read James Ellroy is to see past effecting the present, screaming into the future and burning all in its path. To read a biography on the man is seeing the portrait of man, whose childhood left a mark, took his time to find himself, good to friends, bad to the women in his life, and a writer of skill and great ability. Love Me Fierce in Danger: The Life of James Ellroy by Steven Powell is a biography of a man, a study of a canon, and a life that has few parallels.

James Ellroy had a different name at birth, one that sounded like a political assassin, or a hayseed. Ellroy's parents divorced early, with a lot of enmity, and Ellroy spent time between both parents, a mom that tried to raise him, and a father who spent more time railing on the shrew that he married. Ellroy's mother was murdered, suspect unknown, and Ellroy went to live with his father, a minor Hollywood flunkie, who had seen better days, and spent more time on his couch then providing or caring for his son. Young James loved to read, stealing books when he had to to keep up with his voracious habit. Crime and crime stories were his favorite, books that later helped him when he started breaking into houses for thrills. After the death of his father, drinking nearly killed Ellroy, but golf, AA, books and a need to write gave him something to live for. Starting slow he wrote what he knew, crime, men failing and Los Angeles. Slowly he found his groove, removing words, mining history and people, real and not-so-real, to tell his tales, and success, and madness soon followed.

One great biography, about a man who really had it rough, but also gave it back to people, friends, and especially women. Ellroy's life is something that if one read it in a book, some would say, that seems like much. Powell writes about the man, not pulling punches, going right to the problems that being around Ellroy can cause, his numerous health issues, and marital problems and paints of portrait of a complicated man, who really was saved by the power of his own words. Powell also is very good in talking about the writing. The book is full of numerous examples, of Ellroy's power and poise in writing, and some clunkers that make one go ehh. Powell also talks about Ellroy's style, his way of removing words, getting the writing down to the bone, and shaving that bone a little more. The book is well sourced with plenty of interviews and discussions, all footnoted. Ellroy seems to have a lot of friends to talk about him, and sadly just as many people that he doesn't talk to anymore.

Not just a good biography about a great writer, but a great biography period. Recommended for fans of course. Also for fans of the mystery novel in general, or for those interested in the cultural history of California. And for people who enjoy biographies about fascinating, troubling people.

[Jack Bell]

"In the end I possess my birthplace and am possessed by its language."

That's the epigraph to James Ellroy's White Jazz, taken from Ross Macdonald — who, as anyone who follows my Goodreads might know, is (along with Ellroy) one of my favourite authors and my reading life's great obsessions.

I thought about that quote while reading this biography, because it seems like there's always been some need to "explain" James Ellroy, or to find something that makes sense of him as one of the great living authors, as an ever-powerfully present public figure, or just as a complicated human being.

And to be a fan of Ellroy's means to know of so much that's been tossed out for this explanation: the historiography or psychic energy of his roots in Los Angeles (as the quote suggests); the spectres of his murdered mother and not-built-for-fatherhood father; his gleefully-admitted criminal past; his life's obsession with alternately chasing, controlling, and submitting to powerful women; his outrageously bold public persona and conservatism (and the degree to which this is just trolling)...

But the best thing about this book is that it presents none of those as some single truth — some "key" to Lee Ellroy the Man or James Ellroy the Artist. It lays out his life as it is, in all its complications, its messiness, and the brilliance of the works that resulted from it.

Finishing this book, I come away with nothing more than an understanding of James Ellroy as a complicated, often contradictory figure. But to be a fan of his is to revel in contradictions. His books are rife with some of the most extreme violence, bigotry, and human degradation imaginable, while at the same time having an incredible amount of humanity and emotional catharsis. And even as a radically ardent leftist, I've never been uncomfortable with my fanaticism for Ellroy as a writer of books dealing almost exclusively with deeply reactionary, heinously conservative characters — or in his often deliberately provocative and politically incorrect public persona.

Maybe these views are all a put-on, maybe they aren't. Yes, this book sheds light on him as an inner-conservative who also just loves provocation, but the truth is I've just never cared that much. Because as I said: to be a fan of James Ellroy is to live in a paradoxical, contradictory universe, and to ultimately be fine with it as a natural part of our lives and our shared history. To be possessed by it as our own language.

After reading this book, do I appreciate or "understand" him more? Maybe. Or maybe I just enjoyed a life story that felt a lot like a James Ellroy novel itself: dark, complexly layered, multi-tangeted, noir-tinged, but ultimately optimistic that even the most downtrodden of protagonists can be healed with the power of love and idealism.

[Lesley · Rating 5 out of 5]

My Recommendation
This is a terrific book for James Ellroy lovers. It relies heavily on Ellroy’s memoir, My Dark Places, but Steven Powell has managed to find additional primary sources in writing this biography.
When Ellroy was eleven years old, his mother was brutally murdered and the perpetrator was never caught. For any child this would be a cataclysm but for Ellroy it only widened the existing schism in his life and personality. His father, Armand, hated Ellroy’s mother for divorcing him and slandered her mercilessly to their son before and after her death. Jean had had expectations of James, and during her weekday custody of the boy their life had rules and structure. Armand was an alcoholic who couldn’t keep a job and couldn’t be bothered giving structure to his son’s life. Having only one surviving parent, however unfit, James internalized much about his father including vengeful feelings toward his late mother. To deal with growing up virtually uneducated, unsocialized, enraged, and starved for attention, Ellroy created antisocial personae that would appear at times throughout his life. In junior high school, he “became” a Nazi and did his best to alienate Jewish students. He became a burglar, a shoplifter, and a peeping tom. In middle age and later, Ellroy would put on his “Dog” personality, talking “jive”, insulting various individuals and groups in foul-mouthed diatribes, especially while speaking in public or in other high stress situations. The “Dog” also contributed to his difficulties with women.
How did a child, then adolescent, with this start in life end up a best-selling author? Love Me Fierce does an admirable job of showing the why of Ellroy’s passionate love for crime fiction, and how he taught himself to master the genre. The other primary storyline is Ellroy’s predictable difficulties with mood instability and with maintaining relationships with women.
I read this book in galley form and was disappointed to come across several mistakes in usage and sentence structure. Some examples: absence of “whom” throughout the book, “The ruthless nature of magazine publishing entailed editors rarely stayed in post for long at GQ”, “…the nature by which he acquired it often underscored his fundamental emotional problems,” “…one of the melancholiest aspects of aging,” “the Marine Corp”, etc. My hope is that errors will corrected before publication.
Fans of L.A. Confidential, The Black Dahlia, White Jazz, American Tabloid, and other books by James Ellroy will enjoy this book which is rich in detail and full of objective analyses of Ellroy’s professional development and personal life.

[Patrick King · Rating 5 out of 5]

I give Dr. Powell's biography of James Ellroy five stars with reservations. I give it five stars because I couldn't stop reading it and while I was reading it I neglected others of my responsibilities to continue reading. James Ellroy is by far my favorite modern writer. I've read everything he's published including his two autobiographical works and I was eager to discover what Dr. Powell had drummed up. He came up with a lot I didn't know but much of it I didn't really need to know either. I've heard of "warts and all" biography but why focus on the warts and neglect the really interesting stuff writers (the prodominant readers of biographies of writers) want to know?

Dr. Powell reminds us on several occasions that Mr. Ellroy never finished high school. Mr. Ellroy did not apparently, based on Dr. Powell's information, attend any college classes. How then does an effectively uneducated person become the predominant male genius of American letters of his era? I don't know and neither will you when you finish reading Dr. Powell's extensive work.

I would much rather know the process by which Ellroy developed his prodigious vocabulary than the number of women he's cohabitated with and why the relationships failed. Dr. Powell mentions that at least one of the outlines of an Ellroy novel exceeded 100 pages. What I don't know is who or what taught Mr. Ellroy how to outline such complex, interwoven plots and execute them with genius. Apparently his first novel, Brown's Requiem, was accepted by an agency on first submission. It certainly should have been. I've read it twice. Where did he get the practice or even the born genius for success like that out of the gate? I still don't know and it frustrates me.

James Ellroy learned his craft somehow and his biography ought to give at least some hint on this actually important aspect of his art. He certainly didn't learn it in bed.

As the art of the American novel has devolved into genre writing and today, as opposed to fifty years ago, our best seller list is dominated by crime stories, horror stories and romance, James Ellroy has elevated the crime novel to the level of genius. One might compare American Tabloid to Dostoevsky's Crime & Punishment. To compare Ellroy to Hammett, Chandlre and MacDonald is to insult him.

[Donna Gowland · Rating 5 out of 5]

Writing a biography about the Demon Dog James Ellroy was always going to be tricky. For one thing, he’s very much alive and every bit as opinionated as he was at the start of his literary career. For the biographer, there’s always going to be a tightrope balance between keeping the subject on side (and risking sanitising the biography to the point of unrecognisable sainthood) or there’s the side of the hellish, unvarnished truth that threatens to make an enemy of its subject.

Mercifully, Steven Powell’s masterly biography walks both paths. Reverential to the figure Powell clearly adores (this is, after all, the fourth book he’s written on Ellroy) this latest release holds nothing of Ellroy’s notoriously difficult life back. Powell starts with the murder of Ellroy’s mother when he was still a ten year old boy called Lee Earle Ellroy, then strips back to the parents that created him, using history to confirm Larkin’s old adage about parental misdeeds. Clearly the die had been cast by Ellroy’s charming but wayward father and complicated but selfish mother. Their blood flows in the veins of the boy who breaks into houses to steal the pants of the girls he’s got crushes on, who graduates to addiction and homelessness before fate takes him on a different path.

There are many incredible stories in this biography and all are dealt with admirable objectivity and lack of judgement. Powell allows the stories to stand for themselves, painting a rich portrait of Ellroy as a difficult but fascinating man for whom age has dulled neither his fire nor his senses. Ellroy wrote in a poem that he wanted to be loved fiercely, ferociously and with dedication; Powell has shown the utmost dedication to the task producing a book which – like the best of Ellroy’s books – is visceral, exciting and lingers in the mind long after you’ve finished the final page.

[Scott Cumming · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm not someone who's pored over all of Ellroy's work, but I was more than intrigued to find out more about his life from the little I knew and Steven Powell delivers a comprehensive account of a life well lived.

The early part of the book is completely wild as we are introduced to Ellroy's parents, who led similarly barnstorming lives before the murder of Ellroy's mother when he was 10 years old. The effect of this on the young Ellroy cannot be understated as even while he believes himself to be the next great crime writer he spends his years scraping by enough to fuel his addiction to alcohol.

Following this the biography becomes more conventional to that of a writer as Ellroy becomes a crime fiction star. Between the book tours, dalliances and Demon Dog antics, Powell analyses some of Ellroy's biggest works digging down into the whys and wherefores of the particular tale he is discussing with the text held against Ellroy's life at the time of writing in order to understand the pieces of him amplified by the text.

Ellroy feels like a specific example of not requiring the same political leanings in order to produce wonderful art as he has done with his L.A. Quartet and Underworld U.S.A. series'. Nor has it stopped multiple women falling for "Dog" whereby their leanings at opposed sides of the spectrum.

Powell's account is never less than captivating as there is usually some tumult around the corner in Ellroy's life or he has produced something wonderful that Powell is unafraid to discuss at length to provide insight into the work and the man. A top notch scholarly biography of an amazing character and writer.

[Gary Sassaman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Back in the late 1980s and early 1990s, James Ellroy was my favorite author. It was the time of his “L.A. Quartet” novels, The Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, L.A. Confidential, and White Jazz, and I couldn’t put them down once I started them. Then something happened. To me, at least, Ellroy’s way of writing—his voice—became more important than the stories he was telling, and he lost me. I found his staccato, “Demon Dog” way of writing unreadable and other than his memoir, My Dark Places, I haven’t read a book of his since, even though every time a new one comes out, I flirt with it on Kindle or in a bookstore, trying it on to see if it fits. It never does.

So it’s ironic that I would find this new literary biography by Steven Powell to be so fascinating. Ellroy’s life is the stuff of his fiction (murdered mother, tortured teenage years, alcohol and drug addiction, obsession with women) and this book reads like one of his novels, one with a particularly damaged protagonist. I really enjoyed reading about Ellroy’s life as recorded by someone other than him. It put Ellroy and his own memoirs into perspective, and brought in many other voices to help tell his story. It’s honest and forthcoming in how Ellroy and his work are perceived and all the personal bits—and there are a lot of them—are wonderful. Ellroy evidently cooperated with Powell on this, as did a lot of his former girlfriends and wife, Helen Knode, along with his publishing associates, like Otto Penzler. Ultimately, Ellroy survived his own life and it’s a great story.

[J Earl · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love Me Fierce in Danger by Steven Powell is just the type of biography that is needed for a figure like James Ellroy, one that goes beyond just recounting a life and gets into understanding it.

While biographies are certainly always read to understand the subject we often come to them just wanting to know more about them. We usually feel we have some understanding and just want to know the details of the life, knowing our understanding will deepen (or change). In Ellroy's case even the understanding we have is cloudy, such that we hope a biography, in recounting the life, will bring an understanding into better focus. For me, that is what Powell accomplishes here. I'm not sure someone who hasn't experienced what Ellroy has can fully understand him, I'm not sure he understands himself (do any of us?), but after reading this I feel like I can see where he is coming from and what he might, unconsciously or not, be trying to do.

This is a biography that should appeal to those who simply love biographies as well as those interested in Ellroy's work. Those interested in literary history will find a lot here to think about as well.

Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.

[Simon Bewick · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an academic biography of Ellroy's life and work to date.
The author clearly had great access to the subject of his work (always a benefit for a biographer) and, of course, a pretty seminal work the subject had already written about his early life and, in particular the murder of his mother and the effect it had on him. To be sure, there are a lot of ibids in the reference, drawing a lot from 'My Dark Places.'
The book goes beyond that book in terms of time and events covered, and a more literary consideration of the man but as detailed and painstakingly researched as it is I didn't get the essence of the subject the way I did through Ellroy's own autobiographical piece - it is, as one might expect, a little dry. Sure, there's a lot of 'scandal' and dark matter, but it's told in such a matter of fact way (with an abundance of footnotes along the way) that I felt this is probably one more for the devoted Ellroy fan than a casual reader of his work or, indeed, anyone not already familiar with him.
Thank you to the publisher and netgalley for the chance to see the book.

[Monica · Rating 4 out of 5]

I know you are going to think I am strange, but I have never read anything Ellroy has written. I have been meaning to, but there are just so many books out there.

I have to say that this was quite the ride. At times I just had to set it aside because of some of the stuff that was described. I can say there are definitely a couple of his books I would like to read now.

I knew Ellroy's mother was murdered when he was a young boy. I never knew though how troubled and, let's face it, terrible his life has been. He has been labeled a womanizer, drug addict, alcoholic, and tempered person. After reading this, I can say that's all true. Plus he is one of the best crime writers out there. I never knew he wrote historical fiction crime books, which I love to read. I learned a ton from reading this book.

Publishes February 9, 2023

Thanks to Netgalley, and Bloomsbury Academic for the Kindle Version of the book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

#netgalley
#bloomsburyacademic

😊 Happy Reading 📚😊

[Andy Raptis · Rating 3 out of 5]

There is not much here if you have already read the other stuff Powell wrote about Ellroy or the stuff Ellroy wrote about himself.
In this book, not only Ellroy comes off as a bag of s**t, but also an addict and mentally unstable person. As for the "demon dog" persona, come on, give me a break. If it's a gimmick to sell more books, it surely is a poor one that seems to have been lifted off a cheap serial killer movie.
The fact is that the stuff he has been writing since 2010 is not very good-I highly doubt the second LA quartet will be completed, it's such a crashing bore. Widespread Panic was bad and The Enchanters was forgettable.
Ellroy was a repetitive writer during his much better times. In the Big Nowhere he was just saying the same things over and over, which makes you wonder if they editors were sleeping when they were supposed to be reading this book.
If you have not read much about Ellroy maybe you will find this book interesting enough but if you have already read multiple times about the murder of his mom or his golf caddy days, you can skip this one.

[David Sprouse · Rating 5 out of 5]

James Ellroy revealed.

James Ellroy is brilliant. James Ellroy is overwhelming. His Demon Dog persona is alternately hilarious and grating. His novels are among the greatest in crime fiction. Black Dahlia and L. A. Confidential are two of my all-time favorites. When I first read L. A. Confidential, it instantly became my favorite book. By the Cold Six Thousand in 2001 his prose style, stream of consciousness, hepcat, in an epic crime thriller is just too much. This explains my complicated feelings about Ellroy. Brilliant one moment, frustrating the next, Ellroy is an original. Sure, he is. He's also an addict, womanizer, a true friend, a terrible friend, and a victim. I've been reading Ellroy since 1987, and I'm not going to stop. This book helped me understand what drives him. James Ellroy. The Demon Dog. The son of a murdered woman. Is he complicated? Oh, you have no idea. Read this book and you will.

[Janalyn, the blind reviewer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Whatever adjectives one would use to describe an epic grand scale literary accomplishment should be given to this book about James Elroy. From his humble beginnings to his gritty stories to those he loved and left into a few things he may not be so proud of it’s all in this book and what a book it is. This isn’t a short biography but all encompassing the author seem to have ate up everything about Mr. Elroy and spit it out on the page and left nothing out I am not big on biographies But I do love some autobiographies and this is definitely one of them. This is a true accomplishment and if it hasn’t won awards yet it definitely should. I received this book from NetGalley and the publisher but I am leaving this review voluntarily please forgive any mistakes as I am blind and dictate my review.

[Kid Ferrous · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a brisk biography, written in short, snappy sentences of lean prose, reminiscent of James Ellroy’s own writing. At times, Ellroy’s life reads like one of his own books: the glamour of the golden age of Hollywood is vividly evoked, with parents who move in the orbits of the movie stars of the day. A divorce leads to hardship and an unhappy existence which culminates in his mother’s murder, an event that would define his entire life.
Steven Powell has undertaken incredible research into Ellroy’s life, with unprecedented access to information, especially regarding the early lives of his parents. It even seems strangely voyeuristic at times. This is a dense book and not the easiest of reads, but it is interesting, visceral and highly recommended to fans of Ellroy’s work.

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Stephen Powell has done excellent research on Ellroy for years through his previous books and his blog The Venetian Vase. I was excited when I first heard about this biography but honestly a little skeptical- how much new info could be revealed about Ellroy’s life that Powell or Ellroy himself hadn’t already written about?

The answer- quite a lot! I was amazed at how much incredible detail Powell provided for the life story of a literary mad genius. Although obviously a fan, Powell doesn’t shy away from some of Ellroy’s more questionable behavior (and to his credit neither does Ellroy himself. In short, if you’re an Ellroy fan and think you’ve heard all the Ellroy stories out there- do yourself a favor and read Love Me Fierce in Danger and be pleasantly surprised.

[Melissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book a lot despite not being familiar with the author, his life or his previous fiction. I have seen and enjoyed L.A. Confidential. In learning about his unique environment growing up and navigating his life I see the correlation to the elements he adds his fiction .
The book didn’t spark my interest in reading any of his novels, perhaps because it was a satisfying experience to know ( from reading this book ) where the author perhaps gleaned elements he adds to his fiction. So in that way, I found the book enjoyable and fulfilling.

It captured my interest and the rare, impactful stories of Ellroy’s life influences made me want to continue to the end.

[Oli Turner]

The life of #jamesellroy #lovemefierceindanger a biography by #stephenpowell published in 2023. Much of the detail of ellroy’s youth and his mother’s murder is covered in ellroy’s memoirs. Where this biography really shines is in details about the writing and publication of each novel in turn plus the details of ellroy’s personal life that occur after the publication of his second memoir the hilliker curse. A lovely highlight are the quotes from interviews with ellroy’s friends and acquaintances. There is some other interesting new information on film/tv/book projects that never came to fruition.

[Mr C · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book is a good read not-so-much because of the quality of the writing (which is great), but more so because of the personality, attitude and behaviour of Ellroy throughout his life. He presents as such an unlikeable person and it is fascinating to read about his efforts to sabotage his career. I guess they do say that the most talented people are also the craziest, and the certainly applies in this case. He treats a lot of people (particularly the women in his life) very badly and I almost wish I didn't love his books so much. This is unlikely to appeal to anybody who doesn't read Ellroy because there are a lot of references to events/characters in his novels.

[Pat Pullum · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a biography of the life of James Ellroy. He wrote LA Confidential and Black Dahlia. His most recognizable works.
Steven Powell obviously has a great understanding of this author and insight into his public and private life. Ellroy is quite an egmatic character and quite the womanizer. He wants to be heard and thinks that everyone is drawn to him. Powell touches on the subject of Ellroy's mothers murder and the turbulent life that seemed to follow Ellroy's childhood..
I thank the author, publisher and Netgalley for my ARC in exchange for my honest review.