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Second L.A. Quartet #1
Perfidia
NATIONAL BESTSELLER
AN NPR BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR
Los Angeles. December, 1941. America stands at the brink of World War II. War fever and racial hatred grip the city.
The hellish murder of a Japanese family summons three men and one woman. LAPD captain William H. Parker is superbly gifted, corrosively ambitious, liquored-up, and consumed by dubious ideology. He is bitterly at odds with Sergeant Dudley Smith—Irish émigré, ex-IRA killer, fledgling war profiteer. Hideo Ashida is a police chemist and the only Japanese on the L.A. cop payroll. Kay Lake is a twenty-one-year-old dilettante looking for adventure. The investigation throws them together and rips them apart. The crime becomes a political storm center that brilliantly illuminates these four driven souls—comrades, rivals, lovers, history’s pawns.
Here, Ellroy gives us the party at the edge of the abyss and the precipice of America’s ascendance. Perfidia is that moment, spellbindingly captured.
AN NPR BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR
Los Angeles. December, 1941. America stands at the brink of World War II. War fever and racial hatred grip the city.
The hellish murder of a Japanese family summons three men and one woman. LAPD captain William H. Parker is superbly gifted, corrosively ambitious, liquored-up, and consumed by dubious ideology. He is bitterly at odds with Sergeant Dudley Smith—Irish émigré, ex-IRA killer, fledgling war profiteer. Hideo Ashida is a police chemist and the only Japanese on the L.A. cop payroll. Kay Lake is a twenty-one-year-old dilettante looking for adventure. The investigation throws them together and rips them apart. The crime becomes a political storm center that brilliantly illuminates these four driven souls—comrades, rivals, lovers, history’s pawns.
Here, Ellroy gives us the party at the edge of the abyss and the precipice of America’s ascendance. Perfidia is that moment, spellbindingly captured.
701 pages, Paperback
First published September 9, 2014
960 people are currently reading
6448 people want to read
About the author
James Ellroy
137 books4,179 followersLee Earle "James" Ellroy is an American crime fiction writer and essayist. Ellroy has become known for a telegrammatic prose style in his most recent work, wherein he frequently omits connecting words and uses only short, staccato sentences, and in particular for the novels The Black Dahlia (1987) and L.A. Confidential (1990).
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October 22, 2019
“Hello, Mr. Ellroy.”
“Mr. Kemper, I hear that you are somewhat familiar with me?”
“I am.”
“Please tell me what you know. Be succinct.”
“You are haunted by the unsolved murder of your mother which occurred when you were a child and led you to become obsessed with crime and women. You frequently dreamed of scenarios in which you could save damsels in distress. You let your rich fantasy life rule you and with no ambition or discipline you became a homeless drunk and drug addict in your teens. You eventually hit bottom and got sober. You became a writer and used your fascination with true crime and post-war Los Angeles to create what you called the L.A. Quartet. You started with a fictionalized version of the Black Dahlia case, and one of the books, L.A. Confidential, became an acclaimed movie. You wrote a trilogy called Underworld USA that followed bad men doing bad things in the shadows of recent American history. You investigated the death of your mother with an ex-cop and published the results as a memoir. You wrote a second autobiography in which you admitted that much of what you wrote about your state of mind in the first book wasn’t true. You recently published a new novel called Perfidia that you state is the start of a new Second L.A. Quartet.
“What are your impressions of Perfidia? Please be brief.”
“Perfidia begins the day before Pearl Harbor is attacked by the Japanese. Many of the characters are ones you used in other books like Dudley Smith, a corrupt police officer who was a large part of the L.A. Quartet, and Kay Lake from The Black Dahlia. Others are based on real life people like William ‘Whiskey Bill’ Parker, another LAPD officer who would go on to become the chief of police. A new addition is a brilliant police crime scene technician, Hideo Ashida, of Japanese descent. The murder of a Japanese family coincides with the news of the attack, and the investigation takes place as L.A. is consumed by a mixture of patriotism and paranoia. Corruption enters the scene immediately with many people scheming on ways to profit from the war even as the ships are still burning at Pearl Harbor.”
“That’s a summary. I asked for your impressions.”
“There is a lot here to appeal to your fans. The wartime setting with a mystery that blends fiction with history against a L.A. that is completely corrupt is something that you know how to utilize to provide a gritty noir atmosphere. Your plotting with the characters aligning and betraying each other almost at whim is as dense and intricate as ever. Your style of short sentences in a stream of consciousness patter as the perspective shifts from character to character is still sharp, and you retain the knack of writing scenes of brutal violence that seem to pass in moments yet leave lasting effects.”
“That’s the positive side. Please tell me where you think the book was lacking.”
“While some longtime fans will be delighted at the way you’ve incorporated so many characters from your other books, it also brings some of the problems inherent to prequels into the mix.”
“Explain.”
“If you know that a character is alive and has a career with the police department in a book set after Perfidia, then I know that they will not die or lose their job in this book despite anything that may occur. This naturally removes some of the drama.”
“Naturally. Please continue.”
“If not done well, the characters may act in ways or accumulate knowledge that seems at odds with the other incarnation. For example,
“I understand the point. Move on."
“Usually your books take place over a period of months or years. This allows for on-going events and new information to change the perspectives and motives of characters. Since this novel occurs entirely in the weeks immediately after Pearl Harbor, the time frame is greatly condensed from your usual work yet you incorporate as many betrayals, shocking revelations and changes of allegiances as your other books. This makes all of the characters seem rushed and erratic. Plus, everyone in the book seems to have an amazing ability to look into the future. None of the major players seem that concerned about the war with the Japanese. All of them somehow immediately know that the war will be won and that there will future tension between America and Russia.”
“Are there any other things you consider shortcomings of the book you would like to share?
“You also use some of the same phrases and tricks here that seem in danger of becoming tropes of your work.”
“State some examples.”
“Using short sentences to indicate a series of actions. For example, ‘Dudley winked. Dudley scratched. Dudley howled….’“
“And?”
“And characters making instant judgments and psychoanalysis of each other that is 100% accurate.”
“And?”
“And repeatedly using the word ‘and’ as a way of continuing the flow of information.”
“Very droll, Mr. Kemper. And?”
“And you really got into this thing where a lot of the dialogue is someone demanding information in a blunt and condescending fashion. You used to save that for when one had a definite edge on another, like J. Edgar Hoover interrogating an underling, but it seemed like it happened on almost every page in this book. These conversations also frequently have one person delivering a set of orders.”
“You have communicated your viewpoint, Mr. Kemper. You will write up a review on Perfidia. You will give it no less than three stars. You may bring up the points you have outlined here, but you will still credit my work as still being an enjoyable read. You will also praise my ability to create damaged characters operating in amoral ways for selfish reasons at a street level and use them to illustrate broader themes on subjects like the effect of History on the individual. Once you have completed this review, you will post it on Goodreads. If you don’t do this, I’ll engage in another trope of mine, and have you shot in the face repeatedly. Do you agree, Mr. Kemper?”
“One three star review of Perfidia coming right up!”
Also posted at Kemper's Book Blog.
“Mr. Kemper, I hear that you are somewhat familiar with me?”
“I am.”
“Please tell me what you know. Be succinct.”
“You are haunted by the unsolved murder of your mother which occurred when you were a child and led you to become obsessed with crime and women. You frequently dreamed of scenarios in which you could save damsels in distress. You let your rich fantasy life rule you and with no ambition or discipline you became a homeless drunk and drug addict in your teens. You eventually hit bottom and got sober. You became a writer and used your fascination with true crime and post-war Los Angeles to create what you called the L.A. Quartet. You started with a fictionalized version of the Black Dahlia case, and one of the books, L.A. Confidential, became an acclaimed movie. You wrote a trilogy called Underworld USA that followed bad men doing bad things in the shadows of recent American history. You investigated the death of your mother with an ex-cop and published the results as a memoir. You wrote a second autobiography in which you admitted that much of what you wrote about your state of mind in the first book wasn’t true. You recently published a new novel called Perfidia that you state is the start of a new Second L.A. Quartet.
“What are your impressions of Perfidia? Please be brief.”
“Perfidia begins the day before Pearl Harbor is attacked by the Japanese. Many of the characters are ones you used in other books like Dudley Smith, a corrupt police officer who was a large part of the L.A. Quartet, and Kay Lake from The Black Dahlia. Others are based on real life people like William ‘Whiskey Bill’ Parker, another LAPD officer who would go on to become the chief of police. A new addition is a brilliant police crime scene technician, Hideo Ashida, of Japanese descent. The murder of a Japanese family coincides with the news of the attack, and the investigation takes place as L.A. is consumed by a mixture of patriotism and paranoia. Corruption enters the scene immediately with many people scheming on ways to profit from the war even as the ships are still burning at Pearl Harbor.”
“That’s a summary. I asked for your impressions.”
“There is a lot here to appeal to your fans. The wartime setting with a mystery that blends fiction with history against a L.A. that is completely corrupt is something that you know how to utilize to provide a gritty noir atmosphere. Your plotting with the characters aligning and betraying each other almost at whim is as dense and intricate as ever. Your style of short sentences in a stream of consciousness patter as the perspective shifts from character to character is still sharp, and you retain the knack of writing scenes of brutal violence that seem to pass in moments yet leave lasting effects.”
“That’s the positive side. Please tell me where you think the book was lacking.”
“While some longtime fans will be delighted at the way you’ve incorporated so many characters from your other books, it also brings some of the problems inherent to prequels into the mix.”
“Explain.”
“If you know that a character is alive and has a career with the police department in a book set after Perfidia, then I know that they will not die or lose their job in this book despite anything that may occur. This naturally removes some of the drama.”
“Naturally. Please continue.”
“If not done well, the characters may act in ways or accumulate knowledge that seems at odds with the other incarnation. For example,
“I understand the point. Move on."
“Usually your books take place over a period of months or years. This allows for on-going events and new information to change the perspectives and motives of characters. Since this novel occurs entirely in the weeks immediately after Pearl Harbor, the time frame is greatly condensed from your usual work yet you incorporate as many betrayals, shocking revelations and changes of allegiances as your other books. This makes all of the characters seem rushed and erratic. Plus, everyone in the book seems to have an amazing ability to look into the future. None of the major players seem that concerned about the war with the Japanese. All of them somehow immediately know that the war will be won and that there will future tension between America and Russia.”
“Are there any other things you consider shortcomings of the book you would like to share?
“You also use some of the same phrases and tricks here that seem in danger of becoming tropes of your work.”
“State some examples.”
“Using short sentences to indicate a series of actions. For example, ‘Dudley winked. Dudley scratched. Dudley howled….’“
“And?”
“And characters making instant judgments and psychoanalysis of each other that is 100% accurate.”
“And?”
“And repeatedly using the word ‘and’ as a way of continuing the flow of information.”
“Very droll, Mr. Kemper. And?”
“And you really got into this thing where a lot of the dialogue is someone demanding information in a blunt and condescending fashion. You used to save that for when one had a definite edge on another, like J. Edgar Hoover interrogating an underling, but it seemed like it happened on almost every page in this book. These conversations also frequently have one person delivering a set of orders.”
“You have communicated your viewpoint, Mr. Kemper. You will write up a review on Perfidia. You will give it no less than three stars. You may bring up the points you have outlined here, but you will still credit my work as still being an enjoyable read. You will also praise my ability to create damaged characters operating in amoral ways for selfish reasons at a street level and use them to illustrate broader themes on subjects like the effect of History on the individual. Once you have completed this review, you will post it on Goodreads. If you don’t do this, I’ll engage in another trope of mine, and have you shot in the face repeatedly. Do you agree, Mr. Kemper?”
“One three star review of Perfidia coming right up!”
Also posted at Kemper's Book Blog.
October 14, 2014
Vacuuming.
I loathe vacuuming. It is outranked in its futility and annoyance only by laundry. Thus, I read and read while my house becomes dirtier and dirtier. Until Perfidia. That fateful afternoon, when I put down Perfidia - unable to force myself to read any longer - and did the unthinkable.
I start with the staircase, which is the easiest and most gratifying part of the house to vacuum given its hardwood floors and lack of obstacles. Begone powdery dirt and mud clumps! I reach the top of the stairs and have a clear line of vision to both the couch in the living room and the closet where I could now stow the vacuum.
I look from Perfidia, perched on the couch, to the vacuum in my hands. Perfidia. Vacuum. Decision.
I continue to vacuum the main floor, starting with the brown area rug that sheds wool as though it is a creature in heat. On my hands and knees, I vacuum underneath the bookshelves — sucking up the fist-sized tumbleweeds composed of the fur of two cats and two long-haired dogs. I navigate the twenty-four chair legs under the dining table. I scour the dreaded zone around the litter box for those pesky, piss-saturated particles that roll for miles. I sweep the pizza crust crumbs off the kitchen counter (have I really eaten that much pizza?) and into the vacuum’s ravenous path. I am slippery with sweat and have reached a natural stopping point as everything on this floor has been cleared.
I look from Perfidia to the vacuum. Perfidia. Vacuum. Decision.
I drag the vacuum to the base of the next staircase: the dreaded, carpeted staircase. Each of its sixteen stairs requires multiple passes, each time using a different attachment. No bristles. Bristles. For the edges. For the flat surfaces. I eventually reach the top. My back aches. I could wrap up the vacuum’s cord and call it quits.
Perfidia. Vacuum. Decision.
I vacuum the top floor of the house. The bathroom tiles, which have been delicately laced with hair - hair so long it could only be mine. Under the nightstands. Behind the headboard. In the dark recesses of the closet. Around the piles of books on the office floor. I am exhausted. My house has not been cleaner in weeks, perhaps months. The carpet looks two shades lighter.
Perfidia. Vacuum. Decision.
I empty the vacuum's bag for the third time. I have nearly filled a trash bag with the detritus. I descend the two flights of stairs to the trash can in the garage. I return to my new friend and gently lay it on its side before attacking the long fibers stuck in the bristles with scissors. Later, I set the vacuum upright and slowly wind the electrical cord around and around and around.
My thoughts return to Perfidia. Obscenely huge with its 691 pages. Confusing with its large cast of characters and lack of explanation. Staccato in its writing. Crude and blunt. Baffling popularity.
Screw Perfidia. I start a load of laundry.
I loathe vacuuming. It is outranked in its futility and annoyance only by laundry. Thus, I read and read while my house becomes dirtier and dirtier. Until Perfidia. That fateful afternoon, when I put down Perfidia - unable to force myself to read any longer - and did the unthinkable.
I start with the staircase, which is the easiest and most gratifying part of the house to vacuum given its hardwood floors and lack of obstacles. Begone powdery dirt and mud clumps! I reach the top of the stairs and have a clear line of vision to both the couch in the living room and the closet where I could now stow the vacuum.
I look from Perfidia, perched on the couch, to the vacuum in my hands. Perfidia. Vacuum. Decision.
I continue to vacuum the main floor, starting with the brown area rug that sheds wool as though it is a creature in heat. On my hands and knees, I vacuum underneath the bookshelves — sucking up the fist-sized tumbleweeds composed of the fur of two cats and two long-haired dogs. I navigate the twenty-four chair legs under the dining table. I scour the dreaded zone around the litter box for those pesky, piss-saturated particles that roll for miles. I sweep the pizza crust crumbs off the kitchen counter (have I really eaten that much pizza?) and into the vacuum’s ravenous path. I am slippery with sweat and have reached a natural stopping point as everything on this floor has been cleared.
I look from Perfidia to the vacuum. Perfidia. Vacuum. Decision.
I drag the vacuum to the base of the next staircase: the dreaded, carpeted staircase. Each of its sixteen stairs requires multiple passes, each time using a different attachment. No bristles. Bristles. For the edges. For the flat surfaces. I eventually reach the top. My back aches. I could wrap up the vacuum’s cord and call it quits.
Perfidia. Vacuum. Decision.
I vacuum the top floor of the house. The bathroom tiles, which have been delicately laced with hair - hair so long it could only be mine. Under the nightstands. Behind the headboard. In the dark recesses of the closet. Around the piles of books on the office floor. I am exhausted. My house has not been cleaner in weeks, perhaps months. The carpet looks two shades lighter.
Perfidia. Vacuum. Decision.
I empty the vacuum's bag for the third time. I have nearly filled a trash bag with the detritus. I descend the two flights of stairs to the trash can in the garage. I return to my new friend and gently lay it on its side before attacking the long fibers stuck in the bristles with scissors. Later, I set the vacuum upright and slowly wind the electrical cord around and around and around.
My thoughts return to Perfidia. Obscenely huge with its 691 pages. Confusing with its large cast of characters and lack of explanation. Staccato in its writing. Crude and blunt. Baffling popularity.
Screw Perfidia. I start a load of laundry.
June 10, 2014
I would think that since James Ellroy is one of my favorite living novelists that I’d check every now and then to see if a new book is in the works. Nope. I think I treat all my favorites as Pynchon’s, new books may come out at some point but they will be rare like unicorns so it’s not worth poking around to see if you can find one (and this would be a sad way to find unicorns because you’re guaranteed to probably never find on if you never look).
But my lack of awareness paid off nicely when after months of putting off looking through any of the Book Expo of America (BEA) materials I finally succumbed on the night before it started and saw, James Ellory is signing at 3pm at Random House. One might think that at this point I’d fire up the magic machine that gives information about all kinds of things and look up James Ellory and New Book, or maybe even go to the little search function at the top of this page and type in James Ellroy and see what his new book was. Nope. Didn’t do that either, which wouldn’t have been difficult since I was on this magical information giving machine at the time.
Instead I typed Random House - Friday, 2pm David Mitchell, 3pm James Ellroy and added to a magical program on the machine that would allow me to see what I typed on the first magical machine on an equally magical pocket sized version of the machine. What wondrous times we live in.
My lack of initiative to find out what exactly I was going to be getting signed by James Ellroy didn’t stop me from bothering Karen with questions about what the book could be. Do you think it’s a long book? Do you think it is one of those very nice looking re-issues with a Chip Kidd cover but which are ultimately kind of unsatisfying? Do you think it’s a continuation of the American Trilogy? Of course Karen didn’t know, and maybe some of these questions I kept to myself but I did wonder about them and again I did nothing to satisfy my curiosity.
This all lead to a nice surprise. First that I’d get to have anything signed by James Ellory, who I hadn’t even thought might be at BEA and second because it was a major novel. I didn’t realize this though until a few seconds before he signed a copy of the book and handed it to me though. Even when I finally broke down and looked up to see what I’d be standing in line to get I still only gave a cursory glance at the description and felt a little disappointed, Japanese Americans, World War 2, Los Angeles. I wanted some American History to keep on rolling from where his last novel left off. Give the dirt and collusion on Reagan’s America, slander the Clintons.
You don’t always get what you want.
Still reading?
After a fairly unsatisfying moment of getting to meet James Ellroy, I leafed through the new tome in my hands and thought, wow, this is going to be awesome. I saw the book ended with a list of characters and where else they appear in the seven novels that make up the LA and Underworld series of novels. Saw that this was the first of a quartet that would be part of the same world but come before the start of The Black Dahlia. Saw lots of familiar names. Hello, old morally dubious friends!
And of course this was the first thing I read as soon as I got home from BEA (ok this is a lie, I finished the new Hardcase Lawrence Block that I got about two hours before Perfidia, but I had started it while waiting on the Random House lines, so while technically a BEA book it shouldn’t count). There were so many books that I’d picked up in the few days there that I was excited to read, but none of them had any chance of being read before this 700 page novel (which Ellroy says is his longest page count novel, I feel like his last couple were longer, but it might have just been the scope and writing style that packed so much more into the pages than this one did).
Preambling enough I should talk about the book. The title comes from a song, specifically the Glenn Miller version of it. You can listen to it while reading the rest of this review, or just imagine that you’re part of Dudley Smith’s opium induced imagination: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0Skao...
It starts on December 6th, 1941. A Saturday morning with a stake out of a pharmacy that had been held up multiple times in the past month. LAPD’s only Japanese cop has created a device to take pictures automatically of every license plate that parks in front of the pharmacy. He and Ray Pinker sit and watch to see if the device works and it isn’t long before the store is held up.
This is how Ellroy decided to start his saga that would result in all the bad shit that goes down through the seven other books. A simple armed robbery.
Later in the day a Japanese family is found dead in their house. Mom, dad, their panty sniffing pervy son, and young daughter. Seppuku. A note about the coming apocalypse. December 6th. The next morning, obviously, is Pearl Harbor.
The story is told from four perspectives, with each chapter switching from one to the other (this can get a little confusing it spots because after the first go around you aren’t told whose perspective you are seeing, you just have to remember that it goes Hideo Ashida, Kay Lake, William Parker, Dudley Smith. This isn’t usually difficult but there are a couple of spots when the characters start colluding where it took me a bit to figure out where we were)
Ashida is the only Japanese cop on the LAPD mentioned above. Kay Lake is a young dilettante with dubious morals. William Parker is a real-life LAPD cop and would be the chief of police in the 1950’s and 60’s. And finally Dudley Smith, the menacing villain through much of the original LA Quartet.
This novel follows the last weeks of 1941 as World War 2 is beginning for the United States. Japanese-Americans in Los Angeles are being rounded up and internment camps are looming as the new must-be places to live of February, 1942.
As civil-rights are being trampled, the case of the Japanese family is turned into a public relations tool. Corruption is everywhere and all four of the main characters are colluding for various advantages of life during wartime.
It’s fairly standard Ellroy stuff. A few really tough guys holding each other by the balls while pointing a throw down piece at the other one’s head; and some people who have to collude with these tough guys if they are going to survive. But it’s in these conspiracies within conspiracies that Ellroy excels, and the scale might be smaller than in American Tabloid where a president ultimately gets killed by these schemes but they are still just as engaging to read.
The stand out in this novel was Dudley Smith. It’s been years since I read the LA Quartet, so some of my memories are hazy, but what I remember in those was Dudley Smith as a looming menace. An untouchable, corrupt and brutal cop who let nothing get in his way. Here we see the rise of Dudley Smith, he’s already the exemplar of the brutal Irish cop, but there is also the humane side of him exposed. He comes across more like Pete Bondurant would become as his story unfolded in The Cold Six Thousand. I’m probably going to remember this book as the Ballad of Dudley Smith(spoiler for those who have read Black Dahlia).
Was this book five stars? Maybe not. It probably isn’t as good as LA Confidential or the first two books of the Underworld trilogy. But still it was quite good. The writing wasn’t as bare bones as what Ellroy was achieving in his last three major novels. It was more a return to the style he wrote in during the beginning of the LA Quartet. It’s still fairly to the point without much excess baggage, but it doesn’t run like a maniac hopped up on bennies. At one point towards the end of the novel Ellroy writes about seven and a half pages in ‘normal prose’ and even though it should have been the part of the story that brought a lot of the threads together it was a slog to get through. Ellroy’s a great writer when he is writing in his style but when he left that style it was all kinds of clunky, or maybe it was just jarring after 658 pages of tightness.
For Ellroy fans this is going to be a must-read. It’s a bazillion times better as a prequel than anything George Lucas ever came up with. For Ellroy neophytes I’d recommend starting at the beginning of either other series. A lot of what is great about this book is seeing many of these characters in their relatively more innocent states.
The one thing I was thinking about right after I finished this book is how good of an HBO series these books would make. I’m thinking a True Detective style for shifting through eras with the same characters meets Game of Thrones and The Wire. I’ll be looking forward to seeing the a season wrap up with a musical montage of Unchained Melody and the trigger about to be pulled on JFK.
But my lack of awareness paid off nicely when after months of putting off looking through any of the Book Expo of America (BEA) materials I finally succumbed on the night before it started and saw, James Ellory is signing at 3pm at Random House. One might think that at this point I’d fire up the magic machine that gives information about all kinds of things and look up James Ellory and New Book, or maybe even go to the little search function at the top of this page and type in James Ellroy and see what his new book was. Nope. Didn’t do that either, which wouldn’t have been difficult since I was on this magical information giving machine at the time.
Instead I typed Random House - Friday, 2pm David Mitchell, 3pm James Ellroy and added to a magical program on the machine that would allow me to see what I typed on the first magical machine on an equally magical pocket sized version of the machine. What wondrous times we live in.
My lack of initiative to find out what exactly I was going to be getting signed by James Ellroy didn’t stop me from bothering Karen with questions about what the book could be. Do you think it’s a long book? Do you think it is one of those very nice looking re-issues with a Chip Kidd cover but which are ultimately kind of unsatisfying? Do you think it’s a continuation of the American Trilogy? Of course Karen didn’t know, and maybe some of these questions I kept to myself but I did wonder about them and again I did nothing to satisfy my curiosity.
This all lead to a nice surprise. First that I’d get to have anything signed by James Ellory, who I hadn’t even thought might be at BEA and second because it was a major novel. I didn’t realize this though until a few seconds before he signed a copy of the book and handed it to me though. Even when I finally broke down and looked up to see what I’d be standing in line to get I still only gave a cursory glance at the description and felt a little disappointed, Japanese Americans, World War 2, Los Angeles. I wanted some American History to keep on rolling from where his last novel left off. Give the dirt and collusion on Reagan’s America, slander the Clintons.
You don’t always get what you want.
Still reading?
After a fairly unsatisfying moment of getting to meet James Ellroy, I leafed through the new tome in my hands and thought, wow, this is going to be awesome. I saw the book ended with a list of characters and where else they appear in the seven novels that make up the LA and Underworld series of novels. Saw that this was the first of a quartet that would be part of the same world but come before the start of The Black Dahlia. Saw lots of familiar names. Hello, old morally dubious friends!
And of course this was the first thing I read as soon as I got home from BEA (ok this is a lie, I finished the new Hardcase Lawrence Block that I got about two hours before Perfidia, but I had started it while waiting on the Random House lines, so while technically a BEA book it shouldn’t count). There were so many books that I’d picked up in the few days there that I was excited to read, but none of them had any chance of being read before this 700 page novel (which Ellroy says is his longest page count novel, I feel like his last couple were longer, but it might have just been the scope and writing style that packed so much more into the pages than this one did).
Preambling enough I should talk about the book. The title comes from a song, specifically the Glenn Miller version of it. You can listen to it while reading the rest of this review, or just imagine that you’re part of Dudley Smith’s opium induced imagination: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0Skao...
It starts on December 6th, 1941. A Saturday morning with a stake out of a pharmacy that had been held up multiple times in the past month. LAPD’s only Japanese cop has created a device to take pictures automatically of every license plate that parks in front of the pharmacy. He and Ray Pinker sit and watch to see if the device works and it isn’t long before the store is held up.
This is how Ellroy decided to start his saga that would result in all the bad shit that goes down through the seven other books. A simple armed robbery.
Later in the day a Japanese family is found dead in their house. Mom, dad, their panty sniffing pervy son, and young daughter. Seppuku. A note about the coming apocalypse. December 6th. The next morning, obviously, is Pearl Harbor.
The story is told from four perspectives, with each chapter switching from one to the other (this can get a little confusing it spots because after the first go around you aren’t told whose perspective you are seeing, you just have to remember that it goes Hideo Ashida, Kay Lake, William Parker, Dudley Smith. This isn’t usually difficult but there are a couple of spots when the characters start colluding where it took me a bit to figure out where we were)
Ashida is the only Japanese cop on the LAPD mentioned above. Kay Lake is a young dilettante with dubious morals. William Parker is a real-life LAPD cop and would be the chief of police in the 1950’s and 60’s. And finally Dudley Smith, the menacing villain through much of the original LA Quartet.
This novel follows the last weeks of 1941 as World War 2 is beginning for the United States. Japanese-Americans in Los Angeles are being rounded up and internment camps are looming as the new must-be places to live of February, 1942.
As civil-rights are being trampled, the case of the Japanese family is turned into a public relations tool. Corruption is everywhere and all four of the main characters are colluding for various advantages of life during wartime.
It’s fairly standard Ellroy stuff. A few really tough guys holding each other by the balls while pointing a throw down piece at the other one’s head; and some people who have to collude with these tough guys if they are going to survive. But it’s in these conspiracies within conspiracies that Ellroy excels, and the scale might be smaller than in American Tabloid where a president ultimately gets killed by these schemes but they are still just as engaging to read.
The stand out in this novel was Dudley Smith. It’s been years since I read the LA Quartet, so some of my memories are hazy, but what I remember in those was Dudley Smith as a looming menace. An untouchable, corrupt and brutal cop who let nothing get in his way. Here we see the rise of Dudley Smith, he’s already the exemplar of the brutal Irish cop, but there is also the humane side of him exposed. He comes across more like Pete Bondurant would become as his story unfolded in The Cold Six Thousand. I’m probably going to remember this book as the Ballad of Dudley Smith(spoiler for those who have read Black Dahlia).
Was this book five stars? Maybe not. It probably isn’t as good as LA Confidential or the first two books of the Underworld trilogy. But still it was quite good. The writing wasn’t as bare bones as what Ellroy was achieving in his last three major novels. It was more a return to the style he wrote in during the beginning of the LA Quartet. It’s still fairly to the point without much excess baggage, but it doesn’t run like a maniac hopped up on bennies. At one point towards the end of the novel Ellroy writes about seven and a half pages in ‘normal prose’ and even though it should have been the part of the story that brought a lot of the threads together it was a slog to get through. Ellroy’s a great writer when he is writing in his style but when he left that style it was all kinds of clunky, or maybe it was just jarring after 658 pages of tightness.
For Ellroy fans this is going to be a must-read. It’s a bazillion times better as a prequel than anything George Lucas ever came up with. For Ellroy neophytes I’d recommend starting at the beginning of either other series. A lot of what is great about this book is seeing many of these characters in their relatively more innocent states.
The one thing I was thinking about right after I finished this book is how good of an HBO series these books would make. I’m thinking a True Detective style for shifting through eras with the same characters meets Game of Thrones and The Wire. I’ll be looking forward to seeing the a season wrap up with a musical montage of Unchained Melody and the trigger about to be pulled on JFK.
November 19, 2014
awesome. just... awesome.
one of the best portraits of obsession in all of fiction.
one of those books that just tractor beams the reader, grinds her up, and shits her out.
blast me forth from your rectum, mr. ellroy!
gobble me whole and crap me out!
do it do it do it!
it's awe-inspiring what ellroy does here: grabs tons of characters from his First LA Quartet* (perfidia is book one of the Second LA Quartet) and Underworld USA Trilogy** and throws 'em into his most densely plotted and highly charged environment yet. doesn't get better.
so why not 5 stars? well, ellroy's plotting is so dense, brutal, and bombastic that one simply feels pummeled. it's exhilerating, but a kind of 'diminishing returns' syndrome sets in whereby the reader simply cannot maintain the level of excitement and focus that ellroy demands. it's a conunudrum: the benzedrine and blood fueled mania creates an effect that a few nice n' easy moments would distrupt; however, the reader just cannot maintain for 700 pgs of this stuff w/o some nice n' easy.
THANK YOU KAREN BRISSETTE!!!!
* Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, L.A. Confidential, White Jazz
** American Tabloid, The Cold Six-Thousand, Blood's A Rover
one of the best portraits of obsession in all of fiction.
one of those books that just tractor beams the reader, grinds her up, and shits her out.
blast me forth from your rectum, mr. ellroy!
gobble me whole and crap me out!
do it do it do it!
it's awe-inspiring what ellroy does here: grabs tons of characters from his First LA Quartet* (perfidia is book one of the Second LA Quartet) and Underworld USA Trilogy** and throws 'em into his most densely plotted and highly charged environment yet. doesn't get better.
so why not 5 stars? well, ellroy's plotting is so dense, brutal, and bombastic that one simply feels pummeled. it's exhilerating, but a kind of 'diminishing returns' syndrome sets in whereby the reader simply cannot maintain the level of excitement and focus that ellroy demands. it's a conunudrum: the benzedrine and blood fueled mania creates an effect that a few nice n' easy moments would distrupt; however, the reader just cannot maintain for 700 pgs of this stuff w/o some nice n' easy.
THANK YOU KAREN BRISSETTE!!!!
* Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, L.A. Confidential, White Jazz
** American Tabloid, The Cold Six-Thousand, Blood's A Rover
March 11, 2016
When it comes to crime fiction I cut my teeth, hell, I fractured my fucking jaw on James Ellroy's LA Quartet. And as far as I am concerned, many imitate the man's style but this particular king is in no danger of being dethroned in this lifetime. Every handful of years or so, when a new backbreaker by Ellroy struts onto the bookstore shelf, I'm one of the first suckers clawing my way through the pages. I'll go on the record and say that, since Ellroy wrote The Black Dahlia and began his long task of rewriting the last half of 20th century American history as a sleazy pulp novel, he has redefined what a crime novel is capable of. Ellroy's L.A. is a world where cops are criminals, politicians are criminals, where everyone is a criminal, and occasionally some of these criminals aren't as terrible of monsters as the rest. Neither optimism nor nostalgia are notions Ellroy tries to sell his readers.
Sadly, Perfidia, which is supposed to launch a prequel quartet of novels that will tie together all the strings of his LA Quartet and his Underworld U.S.A trilogy into one cohesive work, crumbles under its own ambition, and Ellroy's Ellroy-ness as a writer is completely to blame. I don't really have the heart to take the scalpel to this book; and besides, fellow Ellroy devotee Kemper did a wonderful job at pointing out all the cracks in the Ellroy façade in his own review, and in a much more thoughtful and creative way than I can imagine. His beefs are my beefs with the writing, the plotting and the historical context.
I will briefly add that several of the characters who serve as this novel's protagonists have played large roles in previous, chronologically later installments, and much of the information that is revealed about them, as well as their actions during these wild days after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, don't match up with what has already been written, which goes against Ellroy's whole mission statement of making this series of (tentatively) eleven books gel together as one, long-as-life uber-novel. Also, knowing the fate of every character in the book removes a lot of the tension of wondering who the hell is going to manage to walk away from this book alive? (For those not in the know, Ellroy is most likely the originator of the literary trope of having one character empty an entire clip of a gun, point blank, into the head of another character.
But why three stars? Because it is still an Ellroy. It's a big, bold, incredibly violent, wild, densely plotted, rude, nightmarish, sexy, morally reprehensible novel written in a completely idiosyncratic bee-bop staccato of simple sentences. New readers may find a lot to love in this book. Me? I'm just hoping he works out some of these kinks by next book.
Sadly, Perfidia, which is supposed to launch a prequel quartet of novels that will tie together all the strings of his LA Quartet and his Underworld U.S.A trilogy into one cohesive work, crumbles under its own ambition, and Ellroy's Ellroy-ness as a writer is completely to blame. I don't really have the heart to take the scalpel to this book; and besides, fellow Ellroy devotee Kemper did a wonderful job at pointing out all the cracks in the Ellroy façade in his own review, and in a much more thoughtful and creative way than I can imagine. His beefs are my beefs with the writing, the plotting and the historical context.
I will briefly add that several of the characters who serve as this novel's protagonists have played large roles in previous, chronologically later installments, and much of the information that is revealed about them, as well as their actions during these wild days after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, don't match up with what has already been written, which goes against Ellroy's whole mission statement of making this series of (tentatively) eleven books gel together as one, long-as-life uber-novel. Also, knowing the fate of every character in the book removes a lot of the tension of wondering who the hell is going to manage to walk away from this book alive? (For those not in the know, Ellroy is most likely the originator of the literary trope of having one character empty an entire clip of a gun, point blank, into the head of another character.
But why three stars? Because it is still an Ellroy. It's a big, bold, incredibly violent, wild, densely plotted, rude, nightmarish, sexy, morally reprehensible novel written in a completely idiosyncratic bee-bop staccato of simple sentences. New readers may find a lot to love in this book. Me? I'm just hoping he works out some of these kinks by next book.
May 7, 2020
Where do I even begin to start?? Most all of us have heard of James Ellroy, but I must admit that I was only familiar with his work by reputation and from the movie LA Confidential. I have purchased his books but never read one until I decided to start this. It grabs you from the beginning and I am amazed at the intricate plot and wonder how he can keep everything in order. It is hard enough for the reader to keep up with all, let alone the author. I enjoyed the book, although I felt it easily could have been 100-150 pages shorter since some plot lines are more throw away than necessary, or if necessary are just too darn long-winded. But we get to see in this book the beginning of many of the characters and corruption that he carries over into his later works. Everyone has an angle, everyone is trying to make a buck on the upcoming Japanese internment and the murder investigation is almost a side story to what Ellroy portrays as the corrupt LAPD. Ready to tackle more of his works!!
March 25, 2019
Big, bold and uncompromising, if you haven’t read Ellroy before this probably isn’t a good place to start. His 'house style', unique, eclectic, perhaps even eccentric, full of police and other slang which he never deigns to explain, is on full display here and we just have to plunge ourselves into his corrupt and tainted world and find our way as best we can. Ellroy is an uncompromising writer: we either accept his world on his terms or we get out. All the same, there are places where the clipped, laconic tone starts to feel a bit like a parody of itself, something I didn't feel in the earlier books.
Set in 1941 around the time of Pearl Harbour: a Japanese family is found dead, and with a Japanese investigator on the case while his compatriots are being interned, the racial politics of the book are fraught.
Characters from the earlier books (later in terms of chronology) abound and some of the opaque elements of The Black Dahlia and L.A. Confidential are explained (the troubling sexless relationship between Kay Lake and Lee Blanchard) while we get a shocking revelation about Elizabeth Short (the Dahlia) and spend quite a lot of time within the mind of Dudley Smith as well as hearing some of the events that have made him who he is. I was quite unsure about the latter with its rather pat bad-childhood-psychopathic-adult easy connection.
Don’t come to this expecting a linear, defined story. Ellory’s characters are defined by slippery dialogue and contested actions, rather than by what a minimal narrative-expository voice might say about them, and it helps if you’ve met them before in the earlier books set in the 1950s.
So this is the kind of book that I sometimes felt lost in but even when I had no idea what was happening, it remains unputdownable. A dense, stubborn book which refuses to accommodate itself to a reader’s convenience - Ellroy does my head in... but in a good way!
Set in 1941 around the time of Pearl Harbour: a Japanese family is found dead, and with a Japanese investigator on the case while his compatriots are being interned, the racial politics of the book are fraught.
Characters from the earlier books (later in terms of chronology) abound and some of the opaque elements of The Black Dahlia and L.A. Confidential are explained (the troubling sexless relationship between Kay Lake and Lee Blanchard) while we get a shocking revelation about Elizabeth Short (the Dahlia) and spend quite a lot of time within the mind of Dudley Smith as well as hearing some of the events that have made him who he is. I was quite unsure about the latter with its rather pat bad-childhood-psychopathic-adult easy connection.
Don’t come to this expecting a linear, defined story. Ellory’s characters are defined by slippery dialogue and contested actions, rather than by what a minimal narrative-expository voice might say about them, and it helps if you’ve met them before in the earlier books set in the 1950s.
So this is the kind of book that I sometimes felt lost in but even when I had no idea what was happening, it remains unputdownable. A dense, stubborn book which refuses to accommodate itself to a reader’s convenience - Ellroy does my head in... but in a good way!
March 19, 2025
Didn't think he could do it. All these years on and go back in to write a prequel novel to the original LA Quartet and still deliver the goods on such a high level, but I was wrong. I thought I'd left Ellroy behind me, but he's kicked back in big time, with this crime epic which, I was pushed to read because it takes place during World War Two, and I love this period in a novel. As a stand alone novel, had I not read him before it certainly had all the things I'd want in a crime novel, but being familiar with certain characters from before helped a lot too. Ellroy's tough macho prose wasn't as hard as earlier novels, but it still packs a punch; like being hit around the head and walloped in the guts and, surprising, he still manages to write female characters really well. At 800 pages it was never too long for me, and didn't need editing down like some might think. Hell, I wanted more if anything. The story was as gripping and immersive as ever As Ellroy delves into a world of cops & criminals, and criminals that are cops, and in Dudley Smith we have one of the great characters of crime fiction, and he's here again in the years prequeling the first L.A. Quartet, doing good, and bad things, all in the name of justice, and sometimes not. Full of charm when need be, but ruthless, cold and deadly when it really matters. There is so much going on aside from the murder investigation of a Japanese family on the dawn of the pearl harbour attacks, with the relationship between the young dreamer Kay Lake who has her fingers in many pies in regards to other characters; including heavy drinking police captain William H. Parker and LAPD Central Patrol officer, ex-heavyweight boxer, and Dudley Smith henchman, Lee Blanchard. Very much has that classic noir feel of some of the great crime dramas of Hollywood's golden age, and along with the prostitute rackets, commie activity, dodgy land developers, fifth-column fascism, dope running, people smuggling, and more, there is enough going on here to sink a battleship. The novel is also, as I thought it would be, as hard as nails and so brutal at times, as Ellroy paints his sprawling, vivid and kaleidoscopic 1940s L.A full of corruption, WW2 racial tension, escalating violence, and the most snitching and blackmail I think I'll ever come across in a novel. The Big Nowhere is still the best I've read of him, but this isn't far behind. Loved it.
November 11, 2014
I have so few auto-buy authors these days. I used to have many, but one by one I drop them when the stories turn predictable and the writing stale. One actually died, but anyway...
Ellroy is heavy reading, and his dirty staccato style is what makes the scenery come alive. If you've glommed the rest of his catalog you know several players here - Perfidia is a prequel of sorts to his other series. It begins just before the attack on Pearl Harbor with the murder of a Japanese family in LA. Throughout the investigation the story peels away layers to reveal corruption within the police force, sympathies for opposing forces, and a lot of bad language. Ellroy doesn't write rainbows and unicorns.
The only problem I have with Ellroy's books is I have to go back and read the others again to jar my memory. One day I'll sit and have a good binge.
~
As much as I love books, I don't explode into rainbows often when I hear of a pending release, but but but new James Ellroy.
Ellroy is heavy reading, and his dirty staccato style is what makes the scenery come alive. If you've glommed the rest of his catalog you know several players here - Perfidia is a prequel of sorts to his other series. It begins just before the attack on Pearl Harbor with the murder of a Japanese family in LA. Throughout the investigation the story peels away layers to reveal corruption within the police force, sympathies for opposing forces, and a lot of bad language. Ellroy doesn't write rainbows and unicorns.
The only problem I have with Ellroy's books is I have to go back and read the others again to jar my memory. One day I'll sit and have a good binge.
~
As much as I love books, I don't explode into rainbows often when I hear of a pending release, but but but new James Ellroy.
October 11, 2025
Perfidious Profiteers
A review of the Vintage paperback (July 7, 2015) of the Knopf hardcover original (September 9, 2014).
{A 3-star rating which is not so much a Like as an appreciation of the book's relentlessness.]
The self-described "demon dog of American literature" returns with the opening book of a supposed* 2nd L.A. Quartet as a prequel to the original L.A. Quartet (1987-1992) and the Underworld USA Trilogy (1995-2009).
Perfidia is set in December 1941 and opens on the eve of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor which brought the United States into the Second World War. Ellroy's trademark staccato, telegram, bullet-point style** relates a tale of widespread corruption and exploitation by politicians, policemen and public figures seeking to profit from the oncoming internments of American Japanese civilians.
As in the other Ellroy books, the characters are a mix of real-life and fiction. Prominent among the non-fictional figures are various former, current and future Los Angeles Police Chiefs, the then current L.A. Mayor, dozens of movie stars, and the occasional criminal. All of these are portrayed in an unflattering light. Whether the stories are true or are fictitious because dead people can't sue for defamation is left to the imagination of the reader. Major fictional parts are those of L.A. police officers Dudley "Dudster" Smith, Dwight "Bucky" Bleichert and Leland "Lee" Blanchard who all return in the original L.A. Quartet which is set several years later.
A photograph of Little Tokyo, Los Angeles, 1941, which was cropped for use on the cover of the Vintage edition of "Perfidia." Image sourced from Atomikaztex.
I had read all of early James Ellroy in my pre-Goodreads and pre-reviewing days. The increasing length of the later books started to wear on me. It requires a degree of determination to work your way through epic-length texts written in Ellroy's style. I now finally read Perfidia due to a Long Books Challenge with several GR Friends in which we tackle our lengthier TBR books. I can say that I not only read Perfidia, I survived it. 😅
Footnotes
* At the 2023 L.A. Festival of Books, Ellroy said that the series would now be an L.A. Quintet. Reference from Wikipedia.
** Examples of the style can be read in my occasional status updates below or here if you are reading outside of Goodreads.
Soundtrack
The song/tune Perfidia (1939 orig music & lyrics by Alberto Dominguez/English lyrics by Milton Leeds) is heard as the background to several scenes in the book either on the radio or in nightclubs. The popular version in 1941 was by the Glenn Miller Orchestra which you can listen to on YouTube here or on Spotify here.
A review of the Vintage paperback (July 7, 2015) of the Knopf hardcover original (September 9, 2014).
Land grabs, plastic surgery, blood libel. Rogue cops, sub attacks, a lynch-mob massacre. Pay phones. A white man in a purple sweater. Secret radios and feigned seppuku. The haughty Left and the bellicose Right. A grand alliance of war profiteers.
{A 3-star rating which is not so much a Like as an appreciation of the book's relentlessness.]
The self-described "demon dog of American literature" returns with the opening book of a supposed* 2nd L.A. Quartet as a prequel to the original L.A. Quartet (1987-1992) and the Underworld USA Trilogy (1995-2009).
Perfidia is set in December 1941 and opens on the eve of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor which brought the United States into the Second World War. Ellroy's trademark staccato, telegram, bullet-point style** relates a tale of widespread corruption and exploitation by politicians, policemen and public figures seeking to profit from the oncoming internments of American Japanese civilians.
As in the other Ellroy books, the characters are a mix of real-life and fiction. Prominent among the non-fictional figures are various former, current and future Los Angeles Police Chiefs, the then current L.A. Mayor, dozens of movie stars, and the occasional criminal. All of these are portrayed in an unflattering light. Whether the stories are true or are fictitious because dead people can't sue for defamation is left to the imagination of the reader. Major fictional parts are those of L.A. police officers Dudley "Dudster" Smith, Dwight "Bucky" Bleichert and Leland "Lee" Blanchard who all return in the original L.A. Quartet which is set several years later.
A photograph of Little Tokyo, Los Angeles, 1941, which was cropped for use on the cover of the Vintage edition of "Perfidia." Image sourced from Atomikaztex.
I had read all of early James Ellroy in my pre-Goodreads and pre-reviewing days. The increasing length of the later books started to wear on me. It requires a degree of determination to work your way through epic-length texts written in Ellroy's style. I now finally read Perfidia due to a Long Books Challenge with several GR Friends in which we tackle our lengthier TBR books. I can say that I not only read Perfidia, I survived it. 😅
Footnotes
* At the 2023 L.A. Festival of Books, Ellroy said that the series would now be an L.A. Quintet. Reference from Wikipedia.
** Examples of the style can be read in my occasional status updates below or here if you are reading outside of Goodreads.
Soundtrack
The song/tune Perfidia (1939 orig music & lyrics by Alberto Dominguez/English lyrics by Milton Leeds) is heard as the background to several scenes in the book either on the radio or in nightclubs. The popular version in 1941 was by the Glenn Miller Orchestra which you can listen to on YouTube here or on Spotify here.
January 25, 2024
December 7th is Genesis in the Unholy Bible. The normal phases of the moon have been canceled. Werewolves walk among us, sans lunar compass. They are lost. They know only that they must destroy the beauty that unites each one of us, the beauty that has brought each one of us here.”
- James Ellroy, Perfidia
I was hoping for more. I love Ellroy. He's one of those dozen writers who I own their entire output and will eventually read everything. I'm nearly there now, but it is hard to keep up. I came into this novel with high hopes. How can you not when JCO is throwing out:
"James Ellory is the American Dostoevsky."
- Joyce Carol Oates
And Lehane's positive review in the New York Times, while acknowledging some problems, riffs:
"Ellroy was compared a lot to Chandler in those days. He compared himself to Tolstoy. But his true forebear was Conrad."
- Denis Lehane
There were parts of this novel I felt like Ellroy was a genius. Other parts made me question the quest he was on for a Second LA Quartet. His orginal LA Quartet and Underworld USA Trilogy are nearly perfect. So, perhaps, he should slow down. Take his time with the craft? Ha. Ellroy, like Vollmann and King, is a hypergraphic on caffeine and Benzedrine. He. Can't Slow. down. He is all gas and no breaks. There is absolutely no a cruise control in his life. He will either win or crash. Every time.
In Perfidia, it felt like Ellroy was afraid to take a knife to redundant parts of the novel and indulged a bit too much on the tabloid rumors of dead stars. I'm not a ninny. I can take it and even feel the tattler-expose style fits the form, IF, if it is propping up the story. Here, it was too gilded; a bit too much like slapping some trompe l'œil inside the baroque, dark-closets of the b-rated dead. Some characters were nearly perfect, but others just floated through the book like props. That is the challenge in a novel like this. So many parts, so many characters, so many threads that eventually some just remain untouched, or uninteresting, or unbelievable.
Still, four stars? Yeah, barely, because it was a helluva lift. He missed, sure, but some will never get close to Ellroy's big misses.
- James Ellroy, Perfidia
I was hoping for more. I love Ellroy. He's one of those dozen writers who I own their entire output and will eventually read everything. I'm nearly there now, but it is hard to keep up. I came into this novel with high hopes. How can you not when JCO is throwing out:
"James Ellory is the American Dostoevsky."
- Joyce Carol Oates
And Lehane's positive review in the New York Times, while acknowledging some problems, riffs:
"Ellroy was compared a lot to Chandler in those days. He compared himself to Tolstoy. But his true forebear was Conrad."
- Denis Lehane
There were parts of this novel I felt like Ellroy was a genius. Other parts made me question the quest he was on for a Second LA Quartet. His orginal LA Quartet and Underworld USA Trilogy are nearly perfect. So, perhaps, he should slow down. Take his time with the craft? Ha. Ellroy, like Vollmann and King, is a hypergraphic on caffeine and Benzedrine. He. Can't Slow. down. He is all gas and no breaks. There is absolutely no a cruise control in his life. He will either win or crash. Every time.
In Perfidia, it felt like Ellroy was afraid to take a knife to redundant parts of the novel and indulged a bit too much on the tabloid rumors of dead stars. I'm not a ninny. I can take it and even feel the tattler-expose style fits the form, IF, if it is propping up the story. Here, it was too gilded; a bit too much like slapping some trompe l'œil inside the baroque, dark-closets of the b-rated dead. Some characters were nearly perfect, but others just floated through the book like props. That is the challenge in a novel like this. So many parts, so many characters, so many threads that eventually some just remain untouched, or uninteresting, or unbelievable.
Still, four stars? Yeah, barely, because it was a helluva lift. He missed, sure, but some will never get close to Ellroy's big misses.
July 8, 2016
I guess when the notion of shared ownership was developed for the movies – so that the various Marvel superheroes movies and forthcoming Star Wars films all share characters and plots – James Ellroy was one of the lucky recipients of the original memo. As here we have the first of a new series of crime novels which link directly into his L.A Quartet and The Underworld USA Trilogy (and I will personally be disappointed if there aren’t references to his much less well regarded Lloyd Hopkins trilogy). This is a prequel, so younger versions of characters from both those series appear here. And as a prequel it comes with the normal prequel problems: if we’ve read the original quartet a certain amount of jeopardy and danger is removed as we know which of these characters have to survive; furthermore, why don’t the characters in the later set, but earlier written, novels mention anything about the events of this book?
That’s the problem of writing a prequel in a shared universe, so much is already set in concrete.
But incredibly we have more than just the usual – as Ellroy has given himself an elephant of a continuity problem by early on making clear that Elizabeth Short, notable victim in the original LA Quartet, is the daughter of Dudley Smith, the symbol of all roguish policemen in the same books. Surely there’s no indication of that anywhere in the original quartet, and it’s such a jarring link that one can only wonder why Ellroy thought it was a good idea. It’s like the joke in the last Austin Powers film that Austin and Dr Evil are brothers, but that joke done for real by Ian Fleming for James Bond and Blofeld in some lost novel after ‘You Only Live Twice’. Maybe it’s a decision that will work better later on in this new quartet, but right now it feels like an author having a character he likes and just shoe-horning her in any way he can.
It’s December 1941, on the eve of, and right after, Pearl Harbour. Two LA cops, Dudley Smith and William Parker, as well as police chemist, Hideo Ashida, find themselves investigating the brutal murder of a Japanese family and – this being Ellroy – dealing with the kind of personal demons which would fill an entire sub-strata of hell.
The fact that this is the second LA Quartet suggests immediately that it’s more closely related to ‘The Black Dahlia’, ‘LA Confidential’, ‘The Big Nowhere’ and ‘White Jazz’ than the other books. That’s positive as it makes for a experience less hysterical and more focused than those later novels. It’s not as good a novel though as those in the original LA Quartet, as it’s still a bit hysterical and can probably be more focused, but it’s aiming for the same targets and hits a lot of the time. If you like those books, you’ll buy into this.
Just a note though on the language: Ellroy will argue that the reason there is so much racism and questionable social attitudes in his work is that this is how his characters would have spoken, what they would have believed. I can accept that. But then he’s clearly having so much fun with the racism and with the various anti-homosexual/anti-women/anti-‘anyone who isn’t a red blooded, white, American male’ barbs, insults and slurs, that it mitigates his argument somewhat. Can he really say that he’s just representing his character’s belief system when he’s clearly in love with the rhythm and pace he gets from using racial epithets in every other sentence? I can see why some people wouldn’t get too far into this book (or into most other works by Ellroy, for that matter); and I also know why people like me – who are well disposed to this type of fiction and to this author in particular – can enjoy it whilst still being made to feel a tad uncomfortable.
That’s the problem of writing a prequel in a shared universe, so much is already set in concrete.
But incredibly we have more than just the usual – as Ellroy has given himself an elephant of a continuity problem by early on making clear that Elizabeth Short, notable victim in the original LA Quartet, is the daughter of Dudley Smith, the symbol of all roguish policemen in the same books. Surely there’s no indication of that anywhere in the original quartet, and it’s such a jarring link that one can only wonder why Ellroy thought it was a good idea. It’s like the joke in the last Austin Powers film that Austin and Dr Evil are brothers, but that joke done for real by Ian Fleming for James Bond and Blofeld in some lost novel after ‘You Only Live Twice’. Maybe it’s a decision that will work better later on in this new quartet, but right now it feels like an author having a character he likes and just shoe-horning her in any way he can.
It’s December 1941, on the eve of, and right after, Pearl Harbour. Two LA cops, Dudley Smith and William Parker, as well as police chemist, Hideo Ashida, find themselves investigating the brutal murder of a Japanese family and – this being Ellroy – dealing with the kind of personal demons which would fill an entire sub-strata of hell.
The fact that this is the second LA Quartet suggests immediately that it’s more closely related to ‘The Black Dahlia’, ‘LA Confidential’, ‘The Big Nowhere’ and ‘White Jazz’ than the other books. That’s positive as it makes for a experience less hysterical and more focused than those later novels. It’s not as good a novel though as those in the original LA Quartet, as it’s still a bit hysterical and can probably be more focused, but it’s aiming for the same targets and hits a lot of the time. If you like those books, you’ll buy into this.
Just a note though on the language: Ellroy will argue that the reason there is so much racism and questionable social attitudes in his work is that this is how his characters would have spoken, what they would have believed. I can accept that. But then he’s clearly having so much fun with the racism and with the various anti-homosexual/anti-women/anti-‘anyone who isn’t a red blooded, white, American male’ barbs, insults and slurs, that it mitigates his argument somewhat. Can he really say that he’s just representing his character’s belief system when he’s clearly in love with the rhythm and pace he gets from using racial epithets in every other sentence? I can see why some people wouldn’t get too far into this book (or into most other works by Ellroy, for that matter); and I also know why people like me – who are well disposed to this type of fiction and to this author in particular – can enjoy it whilst still being made to feel a tad uncomfortable.
September 16, 2014
Before I get into it all allow me to make a few statements for context; I have read every one of Elloy's novels. My first exposure came in the form of his short story "High Darktown" which introduced me to "The Black Dahlia" protagonist Officer Lee Blanchard and his obsessions and demons. I was hooked. I devoured every word the man wrote before and since. My favorite piece is still "White Jazz"-the last of the LA Quartet and a sizzling piece of literature that still speaks to me in both style and substance. This new work is part of a new quartet of novels that will link the LA Quartet and the Underground Trilogy into one massive work that technically spans the years 1910-1972 and creates one whole body of work. I applaud the level of detail and the eye that Ellroy has for the city of LA which he is undoubtedly the Noire Poet Laureate of. If you are looking for a good old fashioned tale of dirty cops and the dirty deeds they do the look no further. The main character of Perfidia is none other than the notorious Dudley Liam Smith who fans will recognize from his role in the LA quartet as being one of the most evil cops ever to wear a badge. The story is pretty straightforward; Smith and a brilliant Japanese ME-Hideo Ashida- must solve a string of murders during the period of the attack on pearl harbor. In fact the book takes place in real time from Dec. 6th to Dec. 29th. Soon enough Smith and Ashida find themselves cavorting in a war torn racist, and savagely immoral LA where cops, historical figures, and Hollywood starlets cross paths and indulge in a variety of self destructive behaviors as a shadowy remorseless conspiracy threatens to destroy anybody caught near in its bloody vortex. Its vintage Ellroy replete with crackling dialogue, and enough gore to satisfy his most jaded devotee. So what's the problem you ask? Three major ones in my opinion. The first one is Dudley Smith is a character beyond redemption and following his exploits is much like reading "Killer on the Road" only there is no release from the evil deeds that Smith perpetrates. The idea of a it takes evil to beat evil wears thin and the attempts to humanize such a monstrous figure fall flat. Secondly Ellroy is simply incapable of writing ethnic characters convincingly. Ashida seems more like a collection of CSI like devices to move the investigation forward instead of a real character. Combine that with the over used trope of him being in the closet and you get a lukewarm version of something Ellroy has done before and much better in the form of Deputy Danny Upshaw from the Big Nowhere. The fact that Ashida worships these bad white men and will do anything to stay in their world is a bit color blind but doesn't ring true in its execution. Much like the way the Marshall Bowen character fails in Blood's a rover. Ellroy's white world, while entertaining for its banality, is far too self conscious to explore the obvious racism of the time. Characters just accept it and there roles thinking that their mere existence is the push back. Lastly the other big character in the book is real life future chief of police William H. Parker who Ellroy molds into a character that seems more suitable to his world. Frankly the characterization is so contrived and off the mark that those section are not only difficult to read they are nearly unbelievable. But hey this is a work of fiction so that is a matter of taste and style. I am sure that some will love this book and herald it as Ellroy's return to the genre he loves. My problem is I've been sent this love letter by him before.
December 19, 2015
DNF at 45 %!
A couple of years ago I studied theology and some books I read was good and some books were bloody awful and almost impossible to get through. But one had to. But this one I don't have to finish so now I'm throwing in the towel, saying adiós amigo...Hasta la vista baby!
Ps. I will read Black Dahlia someday, hopefully, that book will be better!
Thank you Netgalley for providing me with a free copy for an honest review!
A couple of years ago I studied theology and some books I read was good and some books were bloody awful and almost impossible to get through. But one had to. But this one I don't have to finish so now I'm throwing in the towel, saying adiós amigo...Hasta la vista baby!
Ps. I will read Black Dahlia someday, hopefully, that book will be better!
Thank you Netgalley for providing me with a free copy for an honest review!
May 29, 2016
Από τον περσινό Αύγουστο είχα να διαβάσω βιβλίο του Τζέιμς Ελρόι και η αλήθεια είναι ότι μου έλειψε η ωμότητα, η περιπλοκότητα και η έντονη ρεαλιστικότητα των ιστοριών του, καθώς φυσικά και η σκληρή γραφή του. Αυτό είναι το έκτο βιβλίο του συγγραφέα που διαβάζω, αλλά μόλις το πρώτο που μπορεί να χαρακτηριστεί ως "τούβλο". Τα βιβλία της Πρώτης Τετραλογίας του Λος Άντζελες (από τα οποία έχω διαβάσει τα δυο) είναι μεγάλα και χορταστικά, αλλά κατά πολύ μικρότερα από τα βιβλία της Τριλογίας του Αμερικάνικου Υποκόσμου (όλα αδιάβαστα μέχρι στιγμής). Το Perfidia, που είναι το πιο καινούργιο βιβλίο του μέχρι το επόμενο, και το οποίο ανήκει στην Δεύτερη Τετραλογία του Λος Άντζελες, από άποψη μεγέθους είναι στην ίδια κατηγορία με τα βιβλία της Τριλογίας. Πρόκειται για ένα πραγματικά ογκώδες, πολυεπίπεδο και απαιτητικό έργο, το οποίο μας καθιστά μάρτυρες μιας άλλης, μακρινής και δύσκολης εποχής.
Το να συνοψίσει κανείς σε λίγες προτάσεις την ιστορία ενός βιβλίου που αποτελείται από χίλιες σελίδες (η ελληνική έκδοση του τουλάχιστον), είναι μάλλον κάτι δύσκολο. Ουσιαστικά η ιστορία ξεκινάει στις 6 Δεκεμβρίου του 1941 και ολοκληρώνεται στις 29 Δεκεμβρίου του ίδιου χρόνου. Μια ημέρα πριν την επίθεση των Ιαπώνων στο Περλ Χάρμπορ, τέσσερα μέλη μιας Γιαπωνέζικης οικογένειας βρίσκονται σφαγμένα στο ίδιο τους το σπίτι. Ιεροτελεστική αυτοκτονία ή δολοφονία; Τέσσερις άνθρωποι -τρεις άντρες και μια γυναίκα-, οι βασικοί πρωταγωνιστές του βιβλίου, θα έρθουν κοντά χάρη στην δολοφονία αυτή, αλλά και χάρη στην τρέλα που θα επικρατήσει τις επόμενες μέρες με την είσοδο των ΗΠΑ στον Β' Παγκόσμιο Πόλεμο και την μαζική φυλάκιση σε φυλακές και στρατόπεδα συγκέντρωσης όλων των Γιαπωνέζων που μέχρι τότε ζούσαν ειρηνικά στον Αμερικάνικο παράδεισο. Η όλη υπόθεση της δολοφονίας της Γιαπωνέζικης οικογένειας, συνδέεται με τον έναν ή τον άλλο τρόπο με την επίθεση στο Περλ Χάρμπορ, την Πέμπτη Φάλαγγα σε Αμερικάνικο έδαφος και όλες τις μηχανορραφίες στα ανώτερα πολιτικά, οικονομικά και αστυνομικά κλιμάκια της πόλης του Λος Άντζελες. Με λίγα λόγια, γίνεται ένας χαμός...
Στο τεράστιο αυτό τούβλο, συναντάμε σε νεαρότερη ηλικία αρκετούς χαρακτήρες από τα βιβλία της Πρώτης Τετραλογίας του Λος Άντζελες (Η Μαύρη Ντάλια, Το Μεγάλο Πουθενά, Λος Άντζελες Εμπιστευτικό, Λευκή Τζαζ), καθώς και από αυτά της Τριλογίας του Αμερικάνικου Υποκόσμου (Αμερικάνικο Ταμπλόιντ, Αμερικάνικο Ταξίδι Θανάτου, Το Αίμα Δεν Σταματάει Ποτέ). Αληθινά πρόσωπα σε φανταστικές ή και παραπλήσιες με την πραγματικότητα καταστάσεις, αλλά και πρόσωπα της φαντασίας του συγγραφέα. Ενδεικτικά: Γουίλιαμ Χ. Πάρκερ, Ντάντλεϊ Σμιθ, Κέι Λέικ, Χιντέο Ασίντα, Λι Μπλάνσαρντ, Μπάκι Μπλάιχερτ, Πρέστον Έξλι, Τζ. Έντγκαρ Χούβερ και πολλοί, πολλοί άλλοι. Αυτό είναι πολύ ενδιαφέρον, γιατί μαθαίνουμε πολλά πράγματα από το παρελθόν τους και κατανοούμε την εξέλιξή τους στα επόμενα βιβλία.
Λοιπόν, το βιβλίο δεν πρέπει να διαβαστεί σαν ένα απλό αστυνομικό μυθιστόρημα, όπου αναζητούμε την ταυτότητα του δολοφόνου ή των δολοφόνων. Πρέπει να διαβαστεί σαν ένα χρονικό τους Λος Άντζελες τον δύσκολο Δεκέμβριο του 1941, με την εγκληματικότητα, την διαφθορά και την είσοδο των ΗΠΑ στον Β' Παγκόσμιο Πόλεμο, μετά την αιφνιδιαστική επίθεση των Ιαπώνων στο Περλ Χάρμπορ. Στο βιβλίο παρελαύνουν δεκάδες χαρακτήρες, συμβαίνουν σημεία και τέρατα -δολοφονίες, πολιτικές μηχανορραφίες, παιχνίδια κατασκόπων και Πεμπτοφαλαγγιτών, ρατσιστικά πογκρόμ, αλλαξοκωλιές-, οπότε έτσι και αλλιώς δεν πρόκειται για μια απλή αστυνομική ιστορία. Το βιβλίο είναι απαιτητικό: Θέλει τον χρόνο του, δεν μπορεί να διαβαστεί χωρίς προσοχή και ησυχία, απαιτεί υπομονή εκ μέρους του αναγνώστη. Δεν είναι ένα βιβλίο για την παραλία. Άλλωστε δεν βολεύει κιόλας, έτσι βαρύ και ασήκωτο που είναι (στην κυριολεξία). Μπρούμυτα στο κρεβάτι, με το αναπόφευκτο μούδιασμα στους αγκώνες και τα χέρια.
Βλέπω ότι έχω γράψει πολλά, αλλά δεν έχω πει κάτι για την γραφή. Κατά την γνώμη μου είναι εξαιρετική. Είναι αυτή που έχει κάνει τον συγγραφέα τόσο μεγάλο όνομα στο είδος της αστυνομικής λογοτεχνίας. Σκληρή, ωμή, έντονα ρεαλιστική, με δυνατές περιγραφές τοπίων και καταστάσεων, απίθανους διαλόγους και μαύρη αίσθηση του χιούμορ. Και, φυσικά, δεν είναι για όλα τα γούστα. Οι κοφτές προτάσεις και οι πολλές λεπτομέρειες μπορεί να κουράσουν αρκετούς αναγνώστες. Όμως εγώ δεν ένιωσα σε κανένα σημείο κούραση. Απόλαυσα την κάθε περιγραφή και τον κάθε διάλογο. Ειλικρινά. Χαίρομαι πάρα πολύ που ο συγγραφέας ταιριάζει με τα γούστα μου. Χαίρομαι πάρα πολύ που ο συγγραφέας υπάρχει και που του έχει δοθεί ιδιαίτερη προσοχή στην Ελλάδα.
Αν και θα μπορούσα να πω και άλλα πολλά για το βιβλίο, θα σταματήσω εδώ, μιας και νομίζω ότι σας έδωσα μια εικόνα. Είναι και καλοκαίρι τώρα, μην σας κουράζω, καταλάβατε πιστεύω ότι το νέο αυτό βιβλίο του μεγάλου Τζέιμς Ελρόι με άφησε απόλυτα ικανοποιημένο και χορτασμένο. Σε πολλά επίπεδα. Όμως δεν μπορώ να το προτείνω ανεπιφύλακτα. Σίγουρα όχι για πρώτη επαφή με τον Ελρόι (σε καμία περίπτωση!), σίγουρα όχι για ένα ανάλαφρο ανάγνωσμα για την παραλία, σίγουρα όχι για μια απλή αστυνομική ιστορία. Το προτείνω, όμως, σε όλους τους φανατικούς αναγνώστες του συγγραφέα, καθώς και στους λάτρεις των πολύπλοκων ιστοριών και μιας χειμαρρώδους, ανατρεπτικής, βρόμικης, σκληρής και τολμηρής γραφής...
Υ.Γ. Η ελληνική έκδοση εξαιρετική (εκδ. Κλειδάριθμος), με πολύ ωραία μετάφραση (Ανδρέας Αποστολίδης είναι αυτός, όχι όποιος και όποιος!) και πολύ προσεκτική επιμέλεια. Χωρίς αμφιβολία, τα είκοσι ευρώ που ξόδεψα έπιασαν τόπο. Έξι μέρες αναγνωστικής απόλαυσης και ψυχαγωγίας.
Το να συνοψίσει κανείς σε λίγες προτάσεις την ιστορία ενός βιβλίου που αποτελείται από χίλιες σελίδες (η ελληνική έκδοση του τουλάχιστον), είναι μάλλον κάτι δύσκολο. Ουσιαστικά η ιστορία ξεκινάει στις 6 Δεκεμβρίου του 1941 και ολοκληρώνεται στις 29 Δεκεμβρίου του ίδιου χρόνου. Μια ημέρα πριν την επίθεση των Ιαπώνων στο Περλ Χάρμπορ, τέσσερα μέλη μιας Γιαπωνέζικης οικογένειας βρίσκονται σφαγμένα στο ίδιο τους το σπίτι. Ιεροτελεστική αυτοκτονία ή δολοφονία; Τέσσερις άνθρωποι -τρεις άντρες και μια γυναίκα-, οι βασικοί πρωταγωνιστές του βιβλίου, θα έρθουν κοντά χάρη στην δολοφονία αυτή, αλλά και χάρη στην τρέλα που θα επικρατήσει τις επόμενες μέρες με την είσοδο των ΗΠΑ στον Β' Παγκόσμιο Πόλεμο και την μαζική φυλάκιση σε φυλακές και στρατόπεδα συγκέντρωσης όλων των Γιαπωνέζων που μέχρι τότε ζούσαν ειρηνικά στον Αμερικάνικο παράδεισο. Η όλη υπόθεση της δολοφονίας της Γιαπωνέζικης οικογένειας, συνδέεται με τον έναν ή τον άλλο τρόπο με την επίθεση στο Περλ Χάρμπορ, την Πέμπτη Φάλαγγα σε Αμερικάνικο έδαφος και όλες τις μηχανορραφίες στα ανώτερα πολιτικά, οικονομικά και αστυνομικά κλιμάκια της πόλης του Λος Άντζελες. Με λίγα λόγια, γίνεται ένας χαμός...
Στο τεράστιο αυτό τούβλο, συναντάμε σε νεαρότερη ηλικία αρκετούς χαρακτήρες από τα βιβλία της Πρώτης Τετραλογίας του Λος Άντζελες (Η Μαύρη Ντάλια, Το Μεγάλο Πουθενά, Λος Άντζελες Εμπιστευτικό, Λευκή Τζαζ), καθώς και από αυτά της Τριλογίας του Αμερικάνικου Υποκόσμου (Αμερικάνικο Ταμπλόιντ, Αμερικάνικο Ταξίδι Θανάτου, Το Αίμα Δεν Σταματάει Ποτέ). Αληθινά πρόσωπα σε φανταστικές ή και παραπλήσιες με την πραγματικότητα καταστάσεις, αλλά και πρόσωπα της φαντασίας του συγγραφέα. Ενδεικτικά: Γουίλιαμ Χ. Πάρκερ, Ντάντλεϊ Σμιθ, Κέι Λέικ, Χιντέο Ασίντα, Λι Μπλάνσαρντ, Μπάκι Μπλάιχερτ, Πρέστον Έξλι, Τζ. Έντγκαρ Χούβερ και πολλοί, πολλοί άλλοι. Αυτό είναι πολύ ενδιαφέρον, γιατί μαθαίνουμε πολλά πράγματα από το παρελθόν τους και κατανοούμε την εξέλιξή τους στα επόμενα βιβλία.
Λοιπόν, το βιβλίο δεν πρέπει να διαβαστεί σαν ένα απλό αστυνομικό μυθιστόρημα, όπου αναζητούμε την ταυτότητα του δολοφόνου ή των δολοφόνων. Πρέπει να διαβαστεί σαν ένα χρονικό τους Λος Άντζελες τον δύσκολο Δεκέμβριο του 1941, με την εγκληματικότητα, την διαφθορά και την είσοδο των ΗΠΑ στον Β' Παγκόσμιο Πόλεμο, μετά την αιφνιδιαστική επίθεση των Ιαπώνων στο Περλ Χάρμπορ. Στο βιβλίο παρελαύνουν δεκάδες χαρακτήρες, συμβαίνουν σημεία και τέρατα -δολοφονίες, πολιτικές μηχανορραφίες, παιχνίδια κατασκόπων και Πεμπτοφαλαγγιτών, ρατσιστικά πογκρόμ, αλλαξοκωλιές-, οπότε έτσι και αλλιώς δεν πρόκειται για μια απλή αστυνομική ιστορία. Το βιβλίο είναι απαιτητικό: Θέλει τον χρόνο του, δεν μπορεί να διαβαστεί χωρίς προσοχή και ησυχία, απαιτεί υπομονή εκ μέρους του αναγνώστη. Δεν είναι ένα βιβλίο για την παραλία. Άλλωστε δεν βολεύει κιόλας, έτσι βαρύ και ασήκωτο που είναι (στην κυριολεξία). Μπρούμυτα στο κρεβάτι, με το αναπόφευκτο μούδιασμα στους αγκώνες και τα χέρια.
Βλέπω ότι έχω γράψει πολλά, αλλά δεν έχω πει κάτι για την γραφή. Κατά την γνώμη μου είναι εξαιρετική. Είναι αυτή που έχει κάνει τον συγγραφέα τόσο μεγάλο όνομα στο είδος της αστυνομικής λογοτεχνίας. Σκληρή, ωμή, έντονα ρεαλιστική, με δυνατές περιγραφές τοπίων και καταστάσεων, απίθανους διαλόγους και μαύρη αίσθηση του χιούμορ. Και, φυσικά, δεν είναι για όλα τα γούστα. Οι κοφτές προτάσεις και οι πολλές λεπτομέρειες μπορεί να κουράσουν αρκετούς αναγνώστες. Όμως εγώ δεν ένιωσα σε κανένα σημείο κούραση. Απόλαυσα την κάθε περιγραφή και τον κάθε διάλογο. Ειλικρινά. Χαίρομαι πάρα πολύ που ο συγγραφέας ταιριάζει με τα γούστα μου. Χαίρομαι πάρα πολύ που ο συγγραφέας υπάρχει και που του έχει δοθεί ιδιαίτερη προσοχή στην Ελλάδα.
Αν και θα μπορούσα να πω και άλλα πολλά για το βιβλίο, θα σταματήσω εδώ, μιας και νομίζω ότι σας έδωσα μια εικόνα. Είναι και καλοκαίρι τώρα, μην σας κουράζω, καταλάβατε πιστεύω ότι το νέο αυτό βιβλίο του μεγάλου Τζέιμς Ελρόι με άφησε απόλυτα ικανοποιημένο και χορτασμένο. Σε πολλά επίπεδα. Όμως δεν μπορώ να το προτείνω ανεπιφύλακτα. Σίγουρα όχι για πρώτη επαφή με τον Ελρόι (σε καμία περίπτωση!), σίγουρα όχι για ένα ανάλαφρο ανάγνωσμα για την παραλία, σίγουρα όχι για μια απλή αστυνομική ιστορία. Το προτείνω, όμως, σε όλους τους φανατικούς αναγνώστες του συγγραφέα, καθώς και στους λάτρεις των πολύπλοκων ιστοριών και μιας χειμαρρώδους, ανατρεπτικής, βρόμικης, σκληρής και τολμηρής γραφής...
Υ.Γ. Η ελληνική έκδοση εξαιρετική (εκδ. Κλειδάριθμος), με πολύ ωραία μετάφραση (Ανδρέας Αποστολίδης είναι αυτός, όχι όποιος και όποιος!) και πολύ προσεκτική επιμέλεια. Χωρίς αμφιβολία, τα είκοσι ευρώ που ξόδεψα έπιασαν τόπο. Έξι μέρες αναγνωστικής απόλαυσης και ψυχαγωγίας.
July 4, 2015
Did Ellroy find the peace ? In all his précédents books, ther was a kind of fury, a rage. He vas haunted by the unpunished murder of his mother. The black daliha was the cristalization of his neurosis.
Here Ellroy work as usual. He spendt a long time in the LA Library searching old news in archiv. This informations allow him to write his books.
The subject is largely unknown and a little exotic. It is about the position of american people Japanese origin at the begining of WWII : murder, vexation...A choral novel, with many carachters. I made a mistake in having a break at the middle. It was difficult to all remember when I read it again.
This distance with his subject give a less passionnate tone. And so it is a kind of "comédie humaine", less thriller, a true novel.
Ellroy, our LA Balzac.
Here Ellroy work as usual. He spendt a long time in the LA Library searching old news in archiv. This informations allow him to write his books.
The subject is largely unknown and a little exotic. It is about the position of american people Japanese origin at the begining of WWII : murder, vexation...A choral novel, with many carachters. I made a mistake in having a break at the middle. It was difficult to all remember when I read it again.
This distance with his subject give a less passionnate tone. And so it is a kind of "comédie humaine", less thriller, a true novel.
Ellroy, our LA Balzac.
August 1, 2016
Ο Τζέιμς Ελρόι έχει αυτοαναγορευτεί σε «Μπετόβεν της σύγχρονης λογοτεχνίας» και, περιέργως, αυτό δεν συνιστά καυχησιά.
Το μόνο σχόλιο που μπορώ να κάνω, αυτή τη στιγμή, για το Perfidia, είναι «πωωωωωωωω!». Ή «πσσσσσς!». Ή «απαπαπαπα...». Επιφωνήματα γενικώς. Θαυμασμού.
Το μόνο σχόλιο που μπορώ να κάνω, αυτή τη στιγμή, για το Perfidia, είναι «πωωωωωωωω!». Ή «πσσσσσς!». Ή «απαπαπαπα...». Επιφωνήματα γενικώς. Θαυμασμού.
Want to read
March 28, 2020James Ellroy stellt hier sein Buch vor:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2O1a...
Bei der Lesung 2015 in Hamburg hat er auch sich selbst vorgestellt, und zwar mit einem Rap:
"Good evening peepers, prowlers, pederasts, panty-sniffers, punks and pimps. I'm James Ellroy, the demon dog, the foul owl with the death growl, the white knight of the far right, and the slick trick with the donkey dick. I'm the author of 16 books, masterpieces all; they precede all my future masterpieces. These books will leave you reamed, steamed and drycleaned, tie-dyed, swept to the side, true-blued, tattooed and bah fongooed. These are books for the whole fuckin' family, if the name of your family is Manson.”
Woah! Gibt es eigentlich Noir-Lyrik oder muss die erst noch erfunden werden?
Und weiter geht es:
"If each and every one of you buys 1000 copies, you will be able to have unlimited sex with each and every person on this earth that you desire every night for the rest of your lives. If each and every one of you buys 2000 copies of my books tonight, you will be able to have unlimited sex with each and every person on this earth that you desire every night for the rest of your lives and still get into heaven as the result of a special dispensation signed by me, The Reverend Ellroy. If each and every one of you buys 3000 copies of my books tonight, you get all that sex, you get into heaven, and—for the first time in its tortured, left, queer counterculture existence—San Francisco will rule the world!"
(hatte er SF durch Hamburg ersetzt? Ich weiß es nicht mehr)
Der Text ist natürlich viel zu gut, um ihn nur einmal zu bringen, und tatsächlich, ich musste feststellen, dass Ellroy zahlreiche Veranstaltungen mit diesen Worten eröffnet hat. Nicht minder charmant:
"Thank you for coming. I realize you had options tonight. You could have stayed home and attended to your sex lives and your drug habits and your dubious San Francisco politics."
Freundliche Frechheiten sind auch ein Weg, sich beliebt zu machen, aber letztlich scheißt Ellroy darauf, ob er geliebt wird oder nicht; worauf er hingegen nicht scheißt ist die Story, die seine Version der Wahrheit ist, einer oft armseligen, verlogenenen, korrupten, politischen, polizeilichen oder mafiösen Wahrheit.
Auch wenn ich PERFIDIA derzeit "auf Pause" habe, will ich doch zumindest schon einmal diese paar Notizen sichern.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2O1a...
Bei der Lesung 2015 in Hamburg hat er auch sich selbst vorgestellt, und zwar mit einem Rap:
"Good evening peepers, prowlers, pederasts, panty-sniffers, punks and pimps. I'm James Ellroy, the demon dog, the foul owl with the death growl, the white knight of the far right, and the slick trick with the donkey dick. I'm the author of 16 books, masterpieces all; they precede all my future masterpieces. These books will leave you reamed, steamed and drycleaned, tie-dyed, swept to the side, true-blued, tattooed and bah fongooed. These are books for the whole fuckin' family, if the name of your family is Manson.”
Woah! Gibt es eigentlich Noir-Lyrik oder muss die erst noch erfunden werden?
Und weiter geht es:
"If each and every one of you buys 1000 copies, you will be able to have unlimited sex with each and every person on this earth that you desire every night for the rest of your lives. If each and every one of you buys 2000 copies of my books tonight, you will be able to have unlimited sex with each and every person on this earth that you desire every night for the rest of your lives and still get into heaven as the result of a special dispensation signed by me, The Reverend Ellroy. If each and every one of you buys 3000 copies of my books tonight, you get all that sex, you get into heaven, and—for the first time in its tortured, left, queer counterculture existence—San Francisco will rule the world!"
(hatte er SF durch Hamburg ersetzt? Ich weiß es nicht mehr)
Der Text ist natürlich viel zu gut, um ihn nur einmal zu bringen, und tatsächlich, ich musste feststellen, dass Ellroy zahlreiche Veranstaltungen mit diesen Worten eröffnet hat. Nicht minder charmant:
"Thank you for coming. I realize you had options tonight. You could have stayed home and attended to your sex lives and your drug habits and your dubious San Francisco politics."
Freundliche Frechheiten sind auch ein Weg, sich beliebt zu machen, aber letztlich scheißt Ellroy darauf, ob er geliebt wird oder nicht; worauf er hingegen nicht scheißt ist die Story, die seine Version der Wahrheit ist, einer oft armseligen, verlogenenen, korrupten, politischen, polizeilichen oder mafiösen Wahrheit.
Auch wenn ich PERFIDIA derzeit "auf Pause" habe, will ich doch zumindest schon einmal diese paar Notizen sichern.
November 27, 2022
This time around we are looking at the American reaction in the police mover-and-shakers as a result of Pearl Harbour. Betty Davis and other actors, and the administration leaning on the police too. All on the same day as a gruesome murder (as you might expect) of a Japanese family in a seemingly ritualistic way.
Even as the pressure for it to be solved vacillates, as the public loves to rally against Japanese—but really all Asian people, since they don’t care to tell the difference at the best of times, except for when they’re slinging slurs—the case ends up owning the headspace of the players from a multifaceted way. Some see it as a point of exploitation, to fan the flames. Others to put it to bed with a manufactured killer. But to probably the “main” protagonist, a Japanese man himself, and the best forensics expert on the force, the case is a splinter in the mind. Something about it needles him and he just won’t let it go. And, of course, pulling on that thread is the A plot.
On the side, Dudley returns. Actually, I was. A bit exasperated by this (at first). But the fleshing out of this character is so well done I really didn’t mind. We finally understand how and why Dudley functions as he does, and how he interacts with women. A deft touch strings together that B plot with the A.
Everything wraps together very well. And boy, Ellroy’s apoplectic approach reaching to stars like Davis and HH and the first main perspective from a shrewd and manipulative woman who takes a while to really show what she’s actually after. In the start she functions more like a grenade than a character - but I liked that a lot. But I’m glad she became more complex. War profiteering in the states is just a phenomenal thing to put under the lens though. It’s far more interesting to me than the left - right political dance, and how it intersects with everyone gave the added bonus that most of these alt history Ellroy books do, which is actually educate you even as it’s hyperbolic and dramatic around the fictional elements.
Even as the pressure for it to be solved vacillates, as the public loves to rally against Japanese—but really all Asian people, since they don’t care to tell the difference at the best of times, except for when they’re slinging slurs—the case ends up owning the headspace of the players from a multifaceted way. Some see it as a point of exploitation, to fan the flames. Others to put it to bed with a manufactured killer. But to probably the “main” protagonist, a Japanese man himself, and the best forensics expert on the force, the case is a splinter in the mind. Something about it needles him and he just won’t let it go. And, of course, pulling on that thread is the A plot.
On the side, Dudley returns. Actually, I was. A bit exasperated by this (at first). But the fleshing out of this character is so well done I really didn’t mind. We finally understand how and why Dudley functions as he does, and how he interacts with women. A deft touch strings together that B plot with the A.
Everything wraps together very well. And boy, Ellroy’s apoplectic approach reaching to stars like Davis and HH and the first main perspective from a shrewd and manipulative woman who takes a while to really show what she’s actually after. In the start she functions more like a grenade than a character - but I liked that a lot. But I’m glad she became more complex. War profiteering in the states is just a phenomenal thing to put under the lens though. It’s far more interesting to me than the left - right political dance, and how it intersects with everyone gave the added bonus that most of these alt history Ellroy books do, which is actually educate you even as it’s hyperbolic and dramatic around the fictional elements.
August 26, 2014
This roller coaster of a novel takes four central characters from the 6th through to the 29th December, 1941. They all revolve around the LAPD and include two antagonistic Catholic officers; William H. Parker, who is ambitious and wants to be the next Chief of Police and the corrupt Dudley Smith, forensic scientist Hideo Ashida, the only Japanese person employed by the LAPD and Kay Lake, who lives with officer Lee Blanchard and whose life, and interests, seem to orbit around the police force.
The book begins with a drugstore robbery and the murder of a Japanese family. Events escalate with the bombing of Pearl Harbour, catapulting America into the war and causing immense problems for the Japanese citizens of LA. However, although patriotism abounds on the streets, many are looking either beyond the war, or to what profit can be made from current events. This is a huge novel and it encompasses some fairly big themes: race, religion, betrayal, obsession, organised crime, corruption, fear and betrayal. If you have read anything by James Ellroy before, you will have some idea of his style. This is gritty noir at its best, with a great deal of violence.
As Japanese Americans begin to be rounded up and interned, Ashida tries to make himself essential to both Smith and Parker, in hope that he can avoid the same fate. Meanwhile, Parker recruits Kay to infiltrate a Hollywood fifth column cell and the murder of the Japanese family needs to solved as a PR exercise which will not necessarily reflect the truth. As well as the four main characters, there are an array of other people who flesh out the plot; from young recruit Scotty Bennett, who faces a shocking start to his career in the police force, boxer Bucky Bleichert, Ace Kwan, who always looks to make money from every situation, the wealthy and left wing party girl, Claire De Haven, and cameo appearances from everyone from Bette Davis to a young JFK.
This is not, however, a pretty portrait of LA. James Ellroy, as you might expect if you have entered his fictional worlds before, creates a dark and gritty underbelly of a city full of drugs, corruption and crime. This is a fantastic novel and will demand both your time and attention, before leaving you both exhausted and hoping for another book featuring the same characters. Thankfully, this is the first in a new LA Quartet and, if you have read the first (The Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, LA Confidential and White Jazz), you will find links and characters from both these books and his Underworld US trilogy (American Tabloid, The Cold Six Thousand and Blood’s a Rover). In fact, in an interview, Ellroy suggested that this new quartet will make, “his oeuvre as a historical novelist one inextricable 11-novel whole.” However, despite the fact that characters have appeared in previous books, it is perfectly possible to read this new novel without having read any of his previous works. Lastly, I received a copy of this book from the publishers, via NetGalley, for review.
The book begins with a drugstore robbery and the murder of a Japanese family. Events escalate with the bombing of Pearl Harbour, catapulting America into the war and causing immense problems for the Japanese citizens of LA. However, although patriotism abounds on the streets, many are looking either beyond the war, or to what profit can be made from current events. This is a huge novel and it encompasses some fairly big themes: race, religion, betrayal, obsession, organised crime, corruption, fear and betrayal. If you have read anything by James Ellroy before, you will have some idea of his style. This is gritty noir at its best, with a great deal of violence.
As Japanese Americans begin to be rounded up and interned, Ashida tries to make himself essential to both Smith and Parker, in hope that he can avoid the same fate. Meanwhile, Parker recruits Kay to infiltrate a Hollywood fifth column cell and the murder of the Japanese family needs to solved as a PR exercise which will not necessarily reflect the truth. As well as the four main characters, there are an array of other people who flesh out the plot; from young recruit Scotty Bennett, who faces a shocking start to his career in the police force, boxer Bucky Bleichert, Ace Kwan, who always looks to make money from every situation, the wealthy and left wing party girl, Claire De Haven, and cameo appearances from everyone from Bette Davis to a young JFK.
This is not, however, a pretty portrait of LA. James Ellroy, as you might expect if you have entered his fictional worlds before, creates a dark and gritty underbelly of a city full of drugs, corruption and crime. This is a fantastic novel and will demand both your time and attention, before leaving you both exhausted and hoping for another book featuring the same characters. Thankfully, this is the first in a new LA Quartet and, if you have read the first (The Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, LA Confidential and White Jazz), you will find links and characters from both these books and his Underworld US trilogy (American Tabloid, The Cold Six Thousand and Blood’s a Rover). In fact, in an interview, Ellroy suggested that this new quartet will make, “his oeuvre as a historical novelist one inextricable 11-novel whole.” However, despite the fact that characters have appeared in previous books, it is perfectly possible to read this new novel without having read any of his previous works. Lastly, I received a copy of this book from the publishers, via NetGalley, for review.
January 6, 2015
A crime fiction epic set amid the backdrop of Peal Harbor, PERFIDIA, is densely rich in characterisation and bedded down with intrinsically linked sub plots that can, at times, be off-putting but ultimately rewarding.
The first book in the Second LA Quartet, PERFIDIA reads familiar for those who have read James Ellroy's previous novels. Characters such as Kay Lake, Lee Blanchard, and Bucky Bleichert are re-imaged as their younger counterparts embroiled in a sinister sleep deprived state of uncertain seduction and apprehensive allegiance to morals following the bombing of Pearl Harbor. This period of flux fraternisation of the film and citizen population leads to a myopic perception of post Pearl Harbor peril compounded by corrupt police and agenda rampant public figures.
I found the best way to read this 700pg plus book was to read significant chunks each day. Stopping and starting will quickly get you lost. The core and ensemble cast all have prominent moments throughout so taking the time to read slloooowwly pays off. PERFIDIA is a not a novel you can gleam over passages despite how tempting it is. James Ellroy does employ the use of a fair amount of filler content which can, at times, be difficult to wade through but the gamble of missing something crucial to proceedings isn't worth undertaking - in my opinion.
Review first appeared on my blog: http://justaguythatlikes2read.blogspo...
The first book in the Second LA Quartet, PERFIDIA reads familiar for those who have read James Ellroy's previous novels. Characters such as Kay Lake, Lee Blanchard, and Bucky Bleichert are re-imaged as their younger counterparts embroiled in a sinister sleep deprived state of uncertain seduction and apprehensive allegiance to morals following the bombing of Pearl Harbor. This period of flux fraternisation of the film and citizen population leads to a myopic perception of post Pearl Harbor peril compounded by corrupt police and agenda rampant public figures.
I found the best way to read this 700pg plus book was to read significant chunks each day. Stopping and starting will quickly get you lost. The core and ensemble cast all have prominent moments throughout so taking the time to read slloooowwly pays off. PERFIDIA is a not a novel you can gleam over passages despite how tempting it is. James Ellroy does employ the use of a fair amount of filler content which can, at times, be difficult to wade through but the gamble of missing something crucial to proceedings isn't worth undertaking - in my opinion.
Review first appeared on my blog: http://justaguythatlikes2read.blogspo...
September 27, 2023
I've been hooked on Ellroy's books all year long. Once again in his Second LA Quartet series, Peridia doesn't disappoint!
Complex characters, and a complex story line hooked me from the start. If you're a fan of L.A. Noir, this is must-read!
Complex characters, and a complex story line hooked me from the start. If you're a fan of L.A. Noir, this is must-read!
June 14, 2016
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o8TrJJ...
Le note della canzone che, oltre ad ispirare il titolo del libro, accompagnano le gesta dei protagonisti, appartengono ad un famoso hit melodico dell’epoca, un po’ dolciastro e quindi in aperto e stridente contrasto con la durezza degli eventi narrati.
Nel costruire questo suo tentacolare romanzo Ellroy resuscita alcuni protagonisti delle sue opere più note ed esemplari e, di conseguenza, per dare una coerenza al corpus delle sue storie losangeline (molti personaggi vi sono tragicamente scomparsi), deve ambientare la scena al decennio precedente a “Dalia nera”, “Il grande nulla”, ecc., il ché, a mo’ di prequel, ci trasporta all’autunno 1941 e ai giorni di Pearl Harbor che segnarono l’entrata degli Usa in guerra.
Questa scelta dà modo all’autore di regalarci le pagine più interessanti di “Perfidia” descrivendo con dovizia di particolari l’ondata di odio antigiapponese che si scatenò nella popolazione americana contro l’imperatore Hirohito e il suo attacco a tradimento, ma anche contro l’incolpevole minoranza di operosi immigrati che da tempo vivevano da cittadini americani a “Little Tokyo” e in altre località della California. [Questi fatti, per inciso hanno fornito il soggetto anche ad altri romanzi come La neve cade sui cedri (D.Guterson) e Venivamo tutte per mare (J.Otsuka)].
La trama “gialla” tuttavia domina il racconto, ma si sdoppia fra un’indagine reale volta ad identificare l’assassino della famiglia nippo-americana sterminata all’inizio del romanzo e un’inchiesta fittizia mirata a fornire all’omicidio il colpevole, ovviamente giapponese, che l’opinione pubblica brama. Ne consegue un intreccio fra depistaggi, occultamento di prove, fabbricazione di falsi reperti, testimonianze estorte con ricatti per lo più a sfondo sessuale, antagonismo sfrenato fra detectives e fra corpi dello stato in una ragnatela narrativa, tipica di Ellroy, di cui francamente sfuggono diversi dettagli e soprattutto le motivazioni razionali di molti dei personaggi coinvolti.
Infatti, altro tipico topos ellroyano, pressoché tutti i detectives implicati nella storia sono segnati non solo da un profondo livello di corruzione ma anche da intime ossessioni, ben alimentate da droghe, alcool e sesso, e da un passato che li rende anime tormentate, inaffidabili, soggetti a scatti di violenza inaudita ma anche a momenti di assoluta fragilità psicologica.
Nelle quasi 900 pagine del romanzo vi è poi l’inevitabile Hollywood, i cui marci eroi di celluloide entrano in carne ed ossa nel plot, spesso come comparse ma a volte come coprotagonisti, c’è il tuffo di prammatica nell’ancor più corrotto inferno messicano (Tijuana, of course!) e tanti altri ingredienti che rendono questo pasticcio un po’ difficile da digerire; ma il cuoco, pur essendo non meno maniacalmente tormentato dei suoi personaggi, è un artista provetto e riesce, contro ogni iniziale previsione, ad assemblare l’insieme a un sufficiente stato di compattezza, con alcune implicazioni irrisolte ma anche con molte sbalorditive esplosioni di azione e di emotività in uno stile che tanti hanno cercato di imitare ma di cui resta forse il solo a detenere la Ricetta!
Le note della canzone che, oltre ad ispirare il titolo del libro, accompagnano le gesta dei protagonisti, appartengono ad un famoso hit melodico dell’epoca, un po’ dolciastro e quindi in aperto e stridente contrasto con la durezza degli eventi narrati.
Nel costruire questo suo tentacolare romanzo Ellroy resuscita alcuni protagonisti delle sue opere più note ed esemplari e, di conseguenza, per dare una coerenza al corpus delle sue storie losangeline (molti personaggi vi sono tragicamente scomparsi), deve ambientare la scena al decennio precedente a “Dalia nera”, “Il grande nulla”, ecc., il ché, a mo’ di prequel, ci trasporta all’autunno 1941 e ai giorni di Pearl Harbor che segnarono l’entrata degli Usa in guerra.
Questa scelta dà modo all’autore di regalarci le pagine più interessanti di “Perfidia” descrivendo con dovizia di particolari l’ondata di odio antigiapponese che si scatenò nella popolazione americana contro l’imperatore Hirohito e il suo attacco a tradimento, ma anche contro l’incolpevole minoranza di operosi immigrati che da tempo vivevano da cittadini americani a “Little Tokyo” e in altre località della California. [Questi fatti, per inciso hanno fornito il soggetto anche ad altri romanzi come La neve cade sui cedri (D.Guterson) e Venivamo tutte per mare (J.Otsuka)].
La trama “gialla” tuttavia domina il racconto, ma si sdoppia fra un’indagine reale volta ad identificare l’assassino della famiglia nippo-americana sterminata all’inizio del romanzo e un’inchiesta fittizia mirata a fornire all’omicidio il colpevole, ovviamente giapponese, che l’opinione pubblica brama. Ne consegue un intreccio fra depistaggi, occultamento di prove, fabbricazione di falsi reperti, testimonianze estorte con ricatti per lo più a sfondo sessuale, antagonismo sfrenato fra detectives e fra corpi dello stato in una ragnatela narrativa, tipica di Ellroy, di cui francamente sfuggono diversi dettagli e soprattutto le motivazioni razionali di molti dei personaggi coinvolti.
Infatti, altro tipico topos ellroyano, pressoché tutti i detectives implicati nella storia sono segnati non solo da un profondo livello di corruzione ma anche da intime ossessioni, ben alimentate da droghe, alcool e sesso, e da un passato che li rende anime tormentate, inaffidabili, soggetti a scatti di violenza inaudita ma anche a momenti di assoluta fragilità psicologica.
Nelle quasi 900 pagine del romanzo vi è poi l’inevitabile Hollywood, i cui marci eroi di celluloide entrano in carne ed ossa nel plot, spesso come comparse ma a volte come coprotagonisti, c’è il tuffo di prammatica nell’ancor più corrotto inferno messicano (Tijuana, of course!) e tanti altri ingredienti che rendono questo pasticcio un po’ difficile da digerire; ma il cuoco, pur essendo non meno maniacalmente tormentato dei suoi personaggi, è un artista provetto e riesce, contro ogni iniziale previsione, ad assemblare l’insieme a un sufficiente stato di compattezza, con alcune implicazioni irrisolte ma anche con molte sbalorditive esplosioni di azione e di emotività in uno stile che tanti hanno cercato di imitare ma di cui resta forse il solo a detenere la Ricetta!
August 28, 2021
Ho letto tutto di Ellroy. Quasi tutto mi e' piaciuto e molti libri sono senza dubbio dei capolavori assoluti. Non questo. Sara' psicoanalisi da cioccolatino ma da quando ha scritto "I miei luoghi oscuri", il nostro eroe non e' piu' lui. Libri mastodontici con centinaia di pagine totalmente inutili, sconclusionate e ben poca sostanza incandescente. Ellroy dei tempi d'oro avrebbe risolto la pratica Perfidia con un compatto crogiolo di piombo fuso. Compatto ma con dentro di tutto e di piu' come solo lui sapeva fare. Sapeva.....
February 18, 2017
Ένας πόλεμος. Η ανάγκη ενός εχθρού. Το κυνήγι Ιαπώνων. Σύγκρουση οπορτουνισμού κ ηθικής. Ένα τετραδιάστατο ψηφιδωτό του τέλους του 41 στο L.A., εκπληκτικής λεπτομέρειας , με ένα χαλαρό σενάριο δολοφονίας που λειτουργεί συνεκτικά κ προσανατολίζει/προωθεί χρονικά την ιστορία. Μπαμ, κρακ, κλικ...
Λατρέψαμε το παρανοϊκό θάρρος του εκτοπισμένου Ιρλανδού.
-- Κανένας δεν ήταν τόσο επικίνδυνος όσο αυτός. Κανένας δεν ήταν τόσο γοητευτικός. Κανείς δεν ήταν τόσο επιτήδειος κ αβρος . Perfidia!
Λατρέψαμε το παρανοϊκό θάρρος του εκτοπισμένου Ιρλανδού.
-- Κανένας δεν ήταν τόσο επικίνδυνος όσο αυτός. Κανένας δεν ήταν τόσο γοητευτικός. Κανείς δεν ήταν τόσο επιτήδειος κ αβρος . Perfidia!
July 13, 2020
Highly stylistic, uber-violent, historical, espionage/crime story with an immersive atmosphere centered on Los Angeles on the eve and aftermath of the Pearl Harbor attack. Two morally and otherwise corrupt policemen vie for power within a corrupt Los Angeles Police Dept (LAPD).
Firstly, this was the first novel in the author’s 1st L.A. Quartet, which precedes the original, but now 2nd L.A. Quartet . (Confusing enough?) In retrospect, reading the earlier written books of the 2nd L.A. Quartet cuts both ways. The good was that having read those books you’re familiar with the author’s eclectic style of writing. The bad was, you’ve already met most of this book’s principal characters, but have not yet received their lethal dose of anti-heroism. However, it’s not necessary to have read the books of the original Quartet to read this book.
Secondly, I read this book as part of a buddy read . This was a long and brutal book. Two (2) of the four (4) participants Did-Not-Finish it. You should note, this story is not going to appeal to many folks.
My dead tree copy was 720-pages with a US copyright of 2014. Pace of the reading was both fast and slow. Toward the end I was reading +100-pages at a sitting.
James Ellroy is a popular American crime fiction author of more than ten major novels, several of which have been made into films.
Prose was mixed. You’d really have to be familiar with the author’s writing style to appreciate and endure it. In places it’s excellent. In others it’s difficult at best. Descriptive prose was harder on the reader than the dialog. The descriptive narration in places verges on the literary, although you’d have to be trained to the author’s minimalist style to appreciate it. The stark, simple sentences used were a very powerful tool in the author’s creation of atmosphere; the success of which waxed and waned. Action was compressed into about 20-days with dates and time events in the ensemble character narrated chapters. I noted how this technique compressed time within the story. I also noted folks rarely slept. The details of this December 1941's atmosphere were generally very good. The vernacular appeared correct, but in places was unfamiliar. In addition, some of the principal characters oddly have very large vocabularies, despite their mean origins. For example, gandy dancer sent me to the dictionary. However, in places the author technically over committed. He mentions a transistor (a post-war technology), in the story with respect to short wave radio. There were several others. If I have a criticism, it was on the author’s attempt to create a pressure cooker atmosphere in a narrowly bound period of time in which there was great change. It was imperfect. Rarely have I read a more violent and frenetic implementation of hard boiled. Sometimes the narrative was too OtT—I rolled my eyes more than once, but persevered. Being the first book in the (new) 1st L.A. Quartet, there was a moderate amount of backstory and a somewhat successful merging long term plot lines found in the (original) 2nd Quartet. This was generally well handled, but sometimes it left me wishing I had not read the 2nd Quartet.
There was sex, drugs, violence and musical references in this story. The sex was not overly graphic, and was handled with an eventual fade to black. Sex was not all heteronormative. Substance abuse was pervasive. Alcoholic consumption was prodigious. (A main character was a lapsed alcoholic.) Tobacco consumption was continuous. Soft and hard core drug usage was sometimes graphically described. (A different character consumes a truly prodigious amount of opiates and amphetamines in a very short period of time.) Violence was graphically detailed. There’s a lot of blood and physical trauma in the story. It’s: edged weapons, firearms and physical. I was frankly initially appalled at the books ultraviolence . It was OtT in places—then I got used to it. Also, as in many stories with a lot of violence, the main characters recuperative powers were truly amazing. Body count was moderate for the genre. Musical references were period, including the eponymous Perfidia ~ Glenn MIller (1939).
There was an ensemble cast of characters. (I dislike ensemble casts.) Characters were a mixed bag. All the characters were deeply flawed. There were no good guys and gals, just less bad ones. The author’s rendering of women characters was also in a slightly better light than the male characters. The POVs were: Hideo Ashida, Kay Lake, William “Whiskey Bill” Parker, and Dudley “The Dudster” Smith. Ashida and Lake were the closest to Good Guys. Parker and Smith were psychopathic, corrupt cops. Lake, Parker and Dudley are major characters in the original quartet. Ashida was a brilliant, homosexual, Japanese LAPD forensics expert. He’s trying to inveigle an LAPD patron into an exemption from interment whilst harboring impure thoughts for an ex-boxer rookie cop. Lake was Ellroy’s Mary Sue. She’s prairie adventuress who comes to the big city to find her fortune. Along the way, she becomes a drug addict, prostitute, cop groupie and develops the vocabulary and mental processes of a post doc. She becomes Parker’s snitch out of lack of anything better to do. The LAPD was a criminal enterprise. Parker and Smith, who are remarkably similar characters, vie with each other to find advantage in the organization. Parker was an alcoholic and Smith was a drug addict. Both are devout Catholics. Both are brilliant, ruthless ideologues. Smith was the more mercenary, while Parker craves recognition and political power. These two are by far the most interesting characters in the book.
In addition, the story contains a cast of hundreds of supporting characters, both fictional and historical (The Usual Suspects). Thankfully there was a dramatis personæ included. Characters include: Soldiers, Sailors, Marines, spies, politicians (all bent), rich men and women, leftist and rightist political agitators, boxers, gamblers, movie stars, movie moguls, lots of bent cops, hookers, pimps, hangers-on, con artists, drug addicts, drug dealers, bent physicians, organized crime figures (both Asian and white). For example, in one short chapter Smith chauffeurs future President John F. Kennedy and then goes for a tryst with movie star Bette Davis.
The story has several plot lines, although it’s a hardboiled police procedural at heart. What was interesting to me was how the author setup plot lines in this book to rendezvous with established plot lines of the 2nd Quartet which he wrote more than 30-years ago (1987). On Pearl Harbor Day, a Japanese family of four (4), the Watanabes are murdered. That begins a sewer crawl through December 1941 LA’s: political corruption, racketeering, murder, extortion, sexploitation, racism, fascist fifth-columns, war-profiteering, torture, Japanese internment and espionage. Despite being psychopaths, both Parker and Smith are cops. With the help of Ashida the cops ‘solve the case’ for their own satisfaction while fighting each other into a LAPD political stalemate. The description of 1940's forensic tech was interesting. Unfortunately, after 600-pages, the ending was a bit of a bum’s rush .
This was a good story, but you had to dig for it. It’s unfortunate it was so long. I am also certain this book would have had a different effect on me, if I’d not read the previous books. While this may be read without having read the 2nd Quartet, I received guilty pleasure from knowing how certain plot-lines the author started in this book turn out. This was also very much a James Ellroy fan book. That's a hard acquired taste-- like 175 Proof Bourbon mixed with lemonade. The level of description was unusually high. It was a perverse history lesson, which I choose to only half-believe. The characterization was mostly great. The Dudster is an epic character. Many of the others were not too shabby. However, this reader had to desensitize themselves to the amphetamine-paced, sordid imbroglio of Ellroy's December 1941 LA to finish the read. As uncomfortable as that was; it was still rewarding.
I’m looking forward to reading the next book in the series This Storm .
Firstly, this was the first novel in the author’s 1st L.A. Quartet, which precedes the original, but now 2nd L.A. Quartet . (Confusing enough?) In retrospect, reading the earlier written books of the 2nd L.A. Quartet cuts both ways. The good was that having read those books you’re familiar with the author’s eclectic style of writing. The bad was, you’ve already met most of this book’s principal characters, but have not yet received their lethal dose of anti-heroism. However, it’s not necessary to have read the books of the original Quartet to read this book.
Secondly, I read this book as part of a buddy read . This was a long and brutal book. Two (2) of the four (4) participants Did-Not-Finish it. You should note, this story is not going to appeal to many folks.
My dead tree copy was 720-pages with a US copyright of 2014. Pace of the reading was both fast and slow. Toward the end I was reading +100-pages at a sitting.
James Ellroy is a popular American crime fiction author of more than ten major novels, several of which have been made into films.
Prose was mixed. You’d really have to be familiar with the author’s writing style to appreciate and endure it. In places it’s excellent. In others it’s difficult at best. Descriptive prose was harder on the reader than the dialog. The descriptive narration in places verges on the literary, although you’d have to be trained to the author’s minimalist style to appreciate it. The stark, simple sentences used were a very powerful tool in the author’s creation of atmosphere; the success of which waxed and waned. Action was compressed into about 20-days with dates and time events in the ensemble character narrated chapters. I noted how this technique compressed time within the story. I also noted folks rarely slept. The details of this December 1941's atmosphere were generally very good. The vernacular appeared correct, but in places was unfamiliar. In addition, some of the principal characters oddly have very large vocabularies, despite their mean origins. For example, gandy dancer sent me to the dictionary. However, in places the author technically over committed. He mentions a transistor (a post-war technology), in the story with respect to short wave radio. There were several others. If I have a criticism, it was on the author’s attempt to create a pressure cooker atmosphere in a narrowly bound period of time in which there was great change. It was imperfect. Rarely have I read a more violent and frenetic implementation of hard boiled. Sometimes the narrative was too OtT—I rolled my eyes more than once, but persevered. Being the first book in the (new) 1st L.A. Quartet, there was a moderate amount of backstory and a somewhat successful merging long term plot lines found in the (original) 2nd Quartet. This was generally well handled, but sometimes it left me wishing I had not read the 2nd Quartet.
There was sex, drugs, violence and musical references in this story. The sex was not overly graphic, and was handled with an eventual fade to black. Sex was not all heteronormative. Substance abuse was pervasive. Alcoholic consumption was prodigious. (A main character was a lapsed alcoholic.) Tobacco consumption was continuous. Soft and hard core drug usage was sometimes graphically described. (A different character consumes a truly prodigious amount of opiates and amphetamines in a very short period of time.) Violence was graphically detailed. There’s a lot of blood and physical trauma in the story. It’s: edged weapons, firearms and physical. I was frankly initially appalled at the books ultraviolence . It was OtT in places—then I got used to it. Also, as in many stories with a lot of violence, the main characters recuperative powers were truly amazing. Body count was moderate for the genre. Musical references were period, including the eponymous Perfidia ~ Glenn MIller (1939).
There was an ensemble cast of characters. (I dislike ensemble casts.) Characters were a mixed bag. All the characters were deeply flawed. There were no good guys and gals, just less bad ones. The author’s rendering of women characters was also in a slightly better light than the male characters. The POVs were: Hideo Ashida, Kay Lake, William “Whiskey Bill” Parker, and Dudley “The Dudster” Smith. Ashida and Lake were the closest to Good Guys. Parker and Smith were psychopathic, corrupt cops. Lake, Parker and Dudley are major characters in the original quartet. Ashida was a brilliant, homosexual, Japanese LAPD forensics expert. He’s trying to inveigle an LAPD patron into an exemption from interment whilst harboring impure thoughts for an ex-boxer rookie cop. Lake was Ellroy’s Mary Sue. She’s prairie adventuress who comes to the big city to find her fortune. Along the way, she becomes a drug addict, prostitute, cop groupie and develops the vocabulary and mental processes of a post doc. She becomes Parker’s snitch out of lack of anything better to do. The LAPD was a criminal enterprise. Parker and Smith, who are remarkably similar characters, vie with each other to find advantage in the organization. Parker was an alcoholic and Smith was a drug addict. Both are devout Catholics. Both are brilliant, ruthless ideologues. Smith was the more mercenary, while Parker craves recognition and political power. These two are by far the most interesting characters in the book.
In addition, the story contains a cast of hundreds of supporting characters, both fictional and historical (The Usual Suspects). Thankfully there was a dramatis personæ included. Characters include: Soldiers, Sailors, Marines, spies, politicians (all bent), rich men and women, leftist and rightist political agitators, boxers, gamblers, movie stars, movie moguls, lots of bent cops, hookers, pimps, hangers-on, con artists, drug addicts, drug dealers, bent physicians, organized crime figures (both Asian and white). For example, in one short chapter Smith chauffeurs future President John F. Kennedy and then goes for a tryst with movie star Bette Davis.
The story has several plot lines, although it’s a hardboiled police procedural at heart. What was interesting to me was how the author setup plot lines in this book to rendezvous with established plot lines of the 2nd Quartet which he wrote more than 30-years ago (1987). On Pearl Harbor Day, a Japanese family of four (4), the Watanabes are murdered. That begins a sewer crawl through December 1941 LA’s: political corruption, racketeering, murder, extortion, sexploitation, racism, fascist fifth-columns, war-profiteering, torture, Japanese internment and espionage. Despite being psychopaths, both Parker and Smith are cops. With the help of Ashida the cops ‘solve the case’ for their own satisfaction while fighting each other into a LAPD political stalemate. The description of 1940's forensic tech was interesting. Unfortunately, after 600-pages, the ending was a bit of a bum’s rush .
This was a good story, but you had to dig for it. It’s unfortunate it was so long. I am also certain this book would have had a different effect on me, if I’d not read the previous books. While this may be read without having read the 2nd Quartet, I received guilty pleasure from knowing how certain plot-lines the author started in this book turn out. This was also very much a James Ellroy fan book. That's a hard acquired taste-- like 175 Proof Bourbon mixed with lemonade. The level of description was unusually high. It was a perverse history lesson, which I choose to only half-believe. The characterization was mostly great. The Dudster is an epic character. Many of the others were not too shabby. However, this reader had to desensitize themselves to the amphetamine-paced, sordid imbroglio of Ellroy's December 1941 LA to finish the read. As uncomfortable as that was; it was still rewarding.
I’m looking forward to reading the next book in the series This Storm .
June 20, 2020
It is funny how time has a way of changing us even as we do not notice any difference. Crime author, James Ellroy has been hands down one of my most favorite writers of all time. I devoured his books like a Frenchman devours odd-smelling cheeses. But after finishing his two most recent novels, Perfidia and This Storm, I am given pause. They seem underwhelming. Has Ellroy lost a step? Were his novels (such as the acclaimed L.A. Confidential) never that special to begin with? Or is it me? Have I changed?
I am taken back to 1993 when I was head over heels in love with my girlfriend (to protect her identity and privacy, I will refer to this incredible woman only as “Janet Jackson”, or just Ms. Jackson if you so happen to be nasty). In my crazy youth I was sure Janet Jackson and I were going to be together forever. We would go on many escapades. When we danced, we discovered our own personal rhythm nation, and not to toot my own horn but in the sack our pleasure principal was craaazy! (Can I get a high five? Anyone, anyone?) If we were apart for even a little bit, I would have to tell Janet Jackson that I miss u much and she would reply by telling me that love would never do without you. But looking back with the eyes of an older man, a man with much less hair on the top of his head and much more hair inside his ears and nose. A man who is seasoned more than a Costco-sized jumbo container of Old bay, I wonder what the heck young me was thinking. This Janet Jackson that I loved so much had a crazy family including a brother who looked like her. Many times, if she did not feel like going out a date with me, she would surreptitiously substitute him for her, and I would not realize it until many days later. I’m still not exactly certain who it was I got to second base with. And there were other things too: she always smelled like skunky weed, she was always pilfering other folk’s cats, she would order twice as much food as she wanted and then make me eat it, not to mention all the arson and witchcraft. And don't even get me started on what she would do whenever the Super Bowl was played... Upon reflection we were not a good match at all and if we stayed together there is no doubt our children would have become notorious serial killers. Well, I guess that’s the way love goes.
Perfidia reminds me of my experience with Janet Jackson. Reading it now I struggle to fathom how I was ever so caught up in Ellroy’s convoluted tales, his pessimistic characters and nihilism. Everyone is racist and really immoral. Back then I thought this was edgy and progressive. I liked the idea of these horrible men making ultimate sacrifices to gain redemptions. Now it just makes me tired. If you are interested, Perfidia is a tangled story of the weeks after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. We have many small chapters from the perspective of numerous characters—Hideo Ashida crime lab scientist, detectives Dudley Smith and William Parker, and dilettante Kay Lake. The story is as twisted as the sting inside a baseball and Ellroy’s prose is as sparse as the Arizona desert. We start with the horrible heinous murder of a Japanese family and then karoom like the ball in a pinball machine in many different directions. Fifth Column networks plotting. Plans to round up and exploit Japanese citizens. Opium, Bette Davis. While readable, Perfidia was a personal disappointment due to my past expectations. I guess you really can’t go home again.
I am taken back to 1993 when I was head over heels in love with my girlfriend (to protect her identity and privacy, I will refer to this incredible woman only as “Janet Jackson”, or just Ms. Jackson if you so happen to be nasty). In my crazy youth I was sure Janet Jackson and I were going to be together forever. We would go on many escapades. When we danced, we discovered our own personal rhythm nation, and not to toot my own horn but in the sack our pleasure principal was craaazy! (Can I get a high five? Anyone, anyone?) If we were apart for even a little bit, I would have to tell Janet Jackson that I miss u much and she would reply by telling me that love would never do without you. But looking back with the eyes of an older man, a man with much less hair on the top of his head and much more hair inside his ears and nose. A man who is seasoned more than a Costco-sized jumbo container of Old bay, I wonder what the heck young me was thinking. This Janet Jackson that I loved so much had a crazy family including a brother who looked like her. Many times, if she did not feel like going out a date with me, she would surreptitiously substitute him for her, and I would not realize it until many days later. I’m still not exactly certain who it was I got to second base with. And there were other things too: she always smelled like skunky weed, she was always pilfering other folk’s cats, she would order twice as much food as she wanted and then make me eat it, not to mention all the arson and witchcraft. And don't even get me started on what she would do whenever the Super Bowl was played... Upon reflection we were not a good match at all and if we stayed together there is no doubt our children would have become notorious serial killers. Well, I guess that’s the way love goes.
Perfidia reminds me of my experience with Janet Jackson. Reading it now I struggle to fathom how I was ever so caught up in Ellroy’s convoluted tales, his pessimistic characters and nihilism. Everyone is racist and really immoral. Back then I thought this was edgy and progressive. I liked the idea of these horrible men making ultimate sacrifices to gain redemptions. Now it just makes me tired. If you are interested, Perfidia is a tangled story of the weeks after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. We have many small chapters from the perspective of numerous characters—Hideo Ashida crime lab scientist, detectives Dudley Smith and William Parker, and dilettante Kay Lake. The story is as twisted as the sting inside a baseball and Ellroy’s prose is as sparse as the Arizona desert. We start with the horrible heinous murder of a Japanese family and then karoom like the ball in a pinball machine in many different directions. Fifth Column networks plotting. Plans to round up and exploit Japanese citizens. Opium, Bette Davis. While readable, Perfidia was a personal disappointment due to my past expectations. I guess you really can’t go home again.
July 26, 2018
Το πρώτο βιβλίο της Δεύτερης Τετραλογίας του Λος Άντζελες ξεκινά με μια "άγρια" συνομωσία μεταξύ του συγγραφέα και της επιτυχίας...
November 20, 2020
Perfidia heißt ein beliebter Song, der von dem, vielleicht, stärksten Gefühl erzählt, das wir kennen – der Liebe – und von jenem Gefühl, das sie oft mit sich bringt – dem Gefühl, betrogen zu werden. Und vom Betrug selbst. Benny Goodman hat es eingespielt, Glenn Miller hat es eingespielt und Ben E. King hat es eingespielt – neben etlichen anderen. Millers Version war in jenen Tagen um den Kriegsausbruch 1941, der für Amerika offiziell mit dem Angriff der Japaner auf Pearl Harbor begann, besonders beliebt. So verwundert es nicht, daß James Ellroy es in dem ersten Teil seines zweiten L.A.-Quartetts immer wieder erklingen lässt, mehr noch: Er entlehnte sogar den Titel für sein Werk.
PERFIDIA (Original erschienen 2014; Deutsch 2016) erzählt allerdings weniger von der Liebe – obwohl auch sie eine nicht gerade kleine Rolle spielt – sondern vor allem vom Betrug. Betrug an anderen Menschen ebenso, wie Betrug am Gemeinwesen, Betrug an der Heimat, vor allem Betrug an den Eiden, die man einmal abgelegt hat. Auf fast 1000 Seiten erzählt Ellroy von einem Mord an vier Japanern gerade am Vorabend des Angriffs auf Pearl Harbor. Schnell ist klar, daß man es nicht einfach mit Selbstmord – wie es allen Ermittelnden des LAPD am liebsten wäre – zu tun hat, auch nicht mit einem herkömmlichen Mord, sondern es steckt offenbar mehr dahinter. War die ermordete Familie Teil der berüchtigten „Fünften Kolonne“?
Im Kern geht es um die Machenschaften von drei Männern und zwei Frauen, die alle in Bezug zu dem Fall stehen. Da gibt es einen jungen japanischstämmigen Forensiker bei der Polizei von L.A., der dringend auf die Hilfe seiner Kollegen angewiesen ist, damit er und seine Familie nicht den sofort nach dem Angriff einsetzenden Internierungen von Japanern im Großraum Los Angeles zum Opfer fallen; da ist ein – der Realität entlehnter – Polizist, der, stockkonservativ und voller religiöser Ressentiments, verschiedene Pläne verfolgt, die vor allem den von ihm gewünschten Aufstieg an die Spitze der Polizeibehörde beinhalten; ein weiterer Polizist kommt ihm dabei immer wieder in die Quere, weshalb diese beiden sich ununterbrochen umkreisen und belauern, es ist dies ein Mann, der eine Menge Pläne verfolgt, Pläne, die wenig mit dem Hüten der Gesetze zu tun haben, sondern viel mehr mit der Umgehung dieser Gesetze; dann gibt es eine junge Frau, die von dem zukünftigen Behördenchef eingesetzt wird, um eine Gruppe linker Agitatoren zu infiltrieren; und es gibt eine Frau, die genau dieser Gruppe vorsteht und sich ungern in die Karten blicken lässt.
Und drum herum gibt es etliche Figuren, die mal häufiger, mal seltener auftreten, aber allesamt wichtige Rollen spielen. Polizisten, Gangster, Schauspieler und Politiker, teils erfunden, teils der Geschichte entnommen. Man braucht ewig, um sich in diesem Dickicht zurecht zu finden und auseinander zu halten, wer hier für die Streife, wer für die Kriminalbehörde, wer für das FBI und wer einfach nur für die Stadtverwaltung tätig ist. Allerdings ist der erfahrene Ellroy-Leser genau das gewohnt und vielleicht erwartet er auch genau solche Verwirrungen. Viele der Figuren kennt, wer das erste L.A.-Quartett gelesen hat, einige sind auch noch in der „Underworld“-Trilogie, die zeitlich dem L.A.-Quartett nachgeordnet ist, aufgetreten. Vor allem der Ermittler Dudley Smith wird wiedererkennen, wer die Vorgängerbände kennt.
Smith ist exakt die Figur, die für Ellroys Schreiben signifikant ist. Der Mann ist kein Faschist und auch kein Rassist, er ist ein Zyniker, der sich jeden und jede zunutze macht, den oder die er gebrauchen kann. Er ist ein eiskalter Killer, Mord ist für ihn eine immer naheliegende Möglichkeit, um seine eigenen Vorhaben durchzusetzen. Mitten im Buch erschießt er einen wehrlosen Japaner in einer Telefonzelle, weil Bette Davis – die Bette Davis, die noch kennt, wer ältere Hollywood-Filme schätzt – ihn nach einer Liebesnacht bittet, für sie einen Japaner umzubringen. Es ist wahrscheinlich die größte Annäherung an ein Gefühl der Liebe, zu dem Dudley Smith fähig ist. Für die, die er lieben sollte – eheliche und uneheliche Töchter bspw. – hat er lediglich Sentiment übrig. Anhand dieser Figur ist aber auch am besten die Differenz zwischen PERFIDIA und den früheren Werken Ellroys zu markieren. Denn es gibt eine Szene im Buch, in der er einer Frau erklärt, in ihm lebe ein Biest. Solange er alle und alles in seiner Umgebung unter Kontrolle halten könne, solange sei alles gut – wenn er aber das Gefühl habe, die Kontrolle zu verlieren, sei er brandgefährlich.
Daß Ellroy einen Protagonisten wie Dudley Smith so etwas aussprechen lässt, zeigt, daß der Autor möglicherweise nicht mehr ganz das Vertrauen in sein Schreiben hat, wie einst. Nie hätte er eine Figur im ersten L.A.-Quartett, in dem Smith eine wesentliche Rolle spielt, eine solche Erklärung abgeben lassen. Er hätte sich einfach darauf verlassen, daß die Art, wie er seine Figuren charakterisiert und die Intelligenz seiner Leser ausreichen, um einen Mann wie Dudley Smith einzuschätzen.
Ellroy ist selbst ein sehr konservativer Mann, der wenig für Linke, Ideale, Utopien übrighat und der das auch gerne mittteilt. Kaum ein Interview, in dem er seine Abneigungen – auch gegen Rock´n´Roll und die 68er – nicht darlegen würde. Er hat eine traurige Geschichte, wurde seine Mutter doch auf bestialische Weise umgebracht, als er noch ein Kind war, er schlug eine gefährliche Laufbahn als Voyeur, Kleinkrimineller und Drogenabhängiger ein, bevor das Schreiben, so hat er es selber oftmals erzählt, ihm das Leben rettete und ihn auf die „richtige“ Bahn führte. Nun soll und muß man ja Autor und Werk trennen. Dennoch sollte man davon ausgehen, daß ein Kerl wie Dudley Smith das Alter Ego dieses Autors darstellt. Seinen eigenen Zynismus schreibt er Männern wie Smtih ein, die in unterschiedlichen Abstufungen des Bösen in allen seinen Büchern auftreten. Sicher ist Ellroy kein Killer. Aber die Haltung, die ein Mann wie Smith der Welt entgegenbringt, dürfte der des Autors nicht allzu fremd sein, zieht man die Gewalt und die Lust am Bruch jeglicher Gesetze und Regeln einmal ab. Und so kommt es, daß es genau diese Figuren sind, die Ellroy hervorragend gelingen und die die stärksten in seinen Werken sind.
Was an Ellroys Schreiben dann so fasziniert, ist, daß man ihm in den Schilderungen dieser Typen so gern folgt. Es sind die größten Widerlinge und dennoch machen sie viel der Spannung aus, die Ellroys Bücher so lesenswert macht. Allerdings stellt sich gerade anhand von PERFIDIA – es wurde oben angedeutet – die Frage, ob das immer und ewig funktioniert. In der Kritik zum Roman wurde öfters angemerkt, daß Ellroy hier den Eindruck erwecke, exakt das zu liefern, was man von einem „Ellroy“ erwartet. Und genau dieser Gedanke kommt dem Leser, der die früheren Werke des Autors kennt. Denn obwohl er auch diesmal eine weit verzweigte Story um Korruption, Verschwörung, politische Infiltration und politische Händel, um Kriegsgewinnler, Schauspieler und ihre dunklen und abartigen Seiten (alle Schauspieler bei Ellroy sind verkommen und entweder schwul oder lesbisch), um harte Kerle und gefährliche Frauen (die meist direkt den Noir-Thrillern der 40er Jahre entnommen scheinen) spinnt, fügt er dem nichts Neues hinzu. Die Protagonisten ergehen sich in übelsten Beleidigungen gegen Schwarze, Juden, Frauen, Schwule, Mexikaner, Japaner und Chinesen, was sicherlich dem Jargon beim LAPD der 40er und 50er Jahre entspricht, was aber auf 1000 Seiten irgendwann ermüdend, da es zur Charakterisierung irgendwann auch nichts mehr beiträgt.
Anders als in früheren Werken, wird die Gewalt nicht mehr ganz so explizit ausgewalzt, anders als in den letzten Werken, hat Ellroy erstaunlicherweise den Stakkato- oder Telegramm-Stil, von dem bei ihm gern die Rede ist und der sein Schreiben bisher so eigen und charakteristisch machte, zurückgeschraubt. Es gibt sogar komplett gefüllte Seiten. Man mag´s kaum glauben. Einzig die Figur des Hideo Ashida, jener junge Forensiker, der unter Smith´ Anleitung schnell lernt, wie man seine eigenen Erkundungen und die eigene Agenda verfolgt und daß man eigentlich nur auf sich selbst vertrauen darf, diese Figur könnte man als neu im Kosmos des James Ellroy bezeichnen. Aber – es wurde soeben angedeutet – auch sie lässt ihre moralischen und ethischen Ambitionen schnell hinter sich und wird zu eben jenem Zyniker, der man wohl sein muß, um im Sumpf des LAPD nach Ellroy zu überleben. Nur die Gewalt, also die unvermittelte Gewalt, hat er von Smith noch nicht übernommen. Da soeben der 2. Band – DIESER STURM (2919) – des neuen L.A.-Quartetts erschienen ist und Ashida erneut eine tragende Rolle spielt, ist aber davon auszugehen, daß der junge Mann auch die Hürde der Gewalt noch nehmen wird. Man darf gespannt sein.
Ellroy ist nichts für zartbesaitete Gemüter, das war er nie. Man muß die Gewalt und den Zynismus aushalten, man muß sich für das Zeitkolorit interessieren, man muß bereit sein, all diesen verschlungenen Pfaden der Handlungen zu folgen und eine Fülle an Personal in Kauf nehmen. Meist wird man dafür mit einem genau recherchierten und lebendigen Gesellschafts- und Zeitportrait belohnt. Und mit Spannung. Ellroy schreibt Noir-Thriller, ohne Frage. Die eigentliche Frage lautet: Hat er es noch drauf, den Leser noch einmal mitzunehmen in die Höllen von Los Angeles? Nimmt man PERFIDIA als Ausgangspunkt, könnten Zweifel aufkommen. So muß man Ellroy-Einsteiger warnen, die Lektüre nicht unbedingt mit diesem Band zu beginnen; als alteingesessener Ellroy-Leser sollte man warten, bis DIESER STURM als Taschenbuch erscheint und ihm dann eine weitere Chance geben. Wer weiß, vielleicht jazzt er sich doch noch einmal in den eigenen Sound hinein, ohne sich selbst zu zitieren oder gar zu kopieren, und vielleicht wächst er an der Aufgabe, die er sich gestellt hat.
PERFIDIA kann leider noch nicht überzeugen, daß der Autor diese Kraft noch hat.
PERFIDIA (Original erschienen 2014; Deutsch 2016) erzählt allerdings weniger von der Liebe – obwohl auch sie eine nicht gerade kleine Rolle spielt – sondern vor allem vom Betrug. Betrug an anderen Menschen ebenso, wie Betrug am Gemeinwesen, Betrug an der Heimat, vor allem Betrug an den Eiden, die man einmal abgelegt hat. Auf fast 1000 Seiten erzählt Ellroy von einem Mord an vier Japanern gerade am Vorabend des Angriffs auf Pearl Harbor. Schnell ist klar, daß man es nicht einfach mit Selbstmord – wie es allen Ermittelnden des LAPD am liebsten wäre – zu tun hat, auch nicht mit einem herkömmlichen Mord, sondern es steckt offenbar mehr dahinter. War die ermordete Familie Teil der berüchtigten „Fünften Kolonne“?
Im Kern geht es um die Machenschaften von drei Männern und zwei Frauen, die alle in Bezug zu dem Fall stehen. Da gibt es einen jungen japanischstämmigen Forensiker bei der Polizei von L.A., der dringend auf die Hilfe seiner Kollegen angewiesen ist, damit er und seine Familie nicht den sofort nach dem Angriff einsetzenden Internierungen von Japanern im Großraum Los Angeles zum Opfer fallen; da ist ein – der Realität entlehnter – Polizist, der, stockkonservativ und voller religiöser Ressentiments, verschiedene Pläne verfolgt, die vor allem den von ihm gewünschten Aufstieg an die Spitze der Polizeibehörde beinhalten; ein weiterer Polizist kommt ihm dabei immer wieder in die Quere, weshalb diese beiden sich ununterbrochen umkreisen und belauern, es ist dies ein Mann, der eine Menge Pläne verfolgt, Pläne, die wenig mit dem Hüten der Gesetze zu tun haben, sondern viel mehr mit der Umgehung dieser Gesetze; dann gibt es eine junge Frau, die von dem zukünftigen Behördenchef eingesetzt wird, um eine Gruppe linker Agitatoren zu infiltrieren; und es gibt eine Frau, die genau dieser Gruppe vorsteht und sich ungern in die Karten blicken lässt.
Und drum herum gibt es etliche Figuren, die mal häufiger, mal seltener auftreten, aber allesamt wichtige Rollen spielen. Polizisten, Gangster, Schauspieler und Politiker, teils erfunden, teils der Geschichte entnommen. Man braucht ewig, um sich in diesem Dickicht zurecht zu finden und auseinander zu halten, wer hier für die Streife, wer für die Kriminalbehörde, wer für das FBI und wer einfach nur für die Stadtverwaltung tätig ist. Allerdings ist der erfahrene Ellroy-Leser genau das gewohnt und vielleicht erwartet er auch genau solche Verwirrungen. Viele der Figuren kennt, wer das erste L.A.-Quartett gelesen hat, einige sind auch noch in der „Underworld“-Trilogie, die zeitlich dem L.A.-Quartett nachgeordnet ist, aufgetreten. Vor allem der Ermittler Dudley Smith wird wiedererkennen, wer die Vorgängerbände kennt.
Smith ist exakt die Figur, die für Ellroys Schreiben signifikant ist. Der Mann ist kein Faschist und auch kein Rassist, er ist ein Zyniker, der sich jeden und jede zunutze macht, den oder die er gebrauchen kann. Er ist ein eiskalter Killer, Mord ist für ihn eine immer naheliegende Möglichkeit, um seine eigenen Vorhaben durchzusetzen. Mitten im Buch erschießt er einen wehrlosen Japaner in einer Telefonzelle, weil Bette Davis – die Bette Davis, die noch kennt, wer ältere Hollywood-Filme schätzt – ihn nach einer Liebesnacht bittet, für sie einen Japaner umzubringen. Es ist wahrscheinlich die größte Annäherung an ein Gefühl der Liebe, zu dem Dudley Smith fähig ist. Für die, die er lieben sollte – eheliche und uneheliche Töchter bspw. – hat er lediglich Sentiment übrig. Anhand dieser Figur ist aber auch am besten die Differenz zwischen PERFIDIA und den früheren Werken Ellroys zu markieren. Denn es gibt eine Szene im Buch, in der er einer Frau erklärt, in ihm lebe ein Biest. Solange er alle und alles in seiner Umgebung unter Kontrolle halten könne, solange sei alles gut – wenn er aber das Gefühl habe, die Kontrolle zu verlieren, sei er brandgefährlich.
Daß Ellroy einen Protagonisten wie Dudley Smith so etwas aussprechen lässt, zeigt, daß der Autor möglicherweise nicht mehr ganz das Vertrauen in sein Schreiben hat, wie einst. Nie hätte er eine Figur im ersten L.A.-Quartett, in dem Smith eine wesentliche Rolle spielt, eine solche Erklärung abgeben lassen. Er hätte sich einfach darauf verlassen, daß die Art, wie er seine Figuren charakterisiert und die Intelligenz seiner Leser ausreichen, um einen Mann wie Dudley Smith einzuschätzen.
Ellroy ist selbst ein sehr konservativer Mann, der wenig für Linke, Ideale, Utopien übrighat und der das auch gerne mittteilt. Kaum ein Interview, in dem er seine Abneigungen – auch gegen Rock´n´Roll und die 68er – nicht darlegen würde. Er hat eine traurige Geschichte, wurde seine Mutter doch auf bestialische Weise umgebracht, als er noch ein Kind war, er schlug eine gefährliche Laufbahn als Voyeur, Kleinkrimineller und Drogenabhängiger ein, bevor das Schreiben, so hat er es selber oftmals erzählt, ihm das Leben rettete und ihn auf die „richtige“ Bahn führte. Nun soll und muß man ja Autor und Werk trennen. Dennoch sollte man davon ausgehen, daß ein Kerl wie Dudley Smith das Alter Ego dieses Autors darstellt. Seinen eigenen Zynismus schreibt er Männern wie Smtih ein, die in unterschiedlichen Abstufungen des Bösen in allen seinen Büchern auftreten. Sicher ist Ellroy kein Killer. Aber die Haltung, die ein Mann wie Smith der Welt entgegenbringt, dürfte der des Autors nicht allzu fremd sein, zieht man die Gewalt und die Lust am Bruch jeglicher Gesetze und Regeln einmal ab. Und so kommt es, daß es genau diese Figuren sind, die Ellroy hervorragend gelingen und die die stärksten in seinen Werken sind.
Was an Ellroys Schreiben dann so fasziniert, ist, daß man ihm in den Schilderungen dieser Typen so gern folgt. Es sind die größten Widerlinge und dennoch machen sie viel der Spannung aus, die Ellroys Bücher so lesenswert macht. Allerdings stellt sich gerade anhand von PERFIDIA – es wurde oben angedeutet – die Frage, ob das immer und ewig funktioniert. In der Kritik zum Roman wurde öfters angemerkt, daß Ellroy hier den Eindruck erwecke, exakt das zu liefern, was man von einem „Ellroy“ erwartet. Und genau dieser Gedanke kommt dem Leser, der die früheren Werke des Autors kennt. Denn obwohl er auch diesmal eine weit verzweigte Story um Korruption, Verschwörung, politische Infiltration und politische Händel, um Kriegsgewinnler, Schauspieler und ihre dunklen und abartigen Seiten (alle Schauspieler bei Ellroy sind verkommen und entweder schwul oder lesbisch), um harte Kerle und gefährliche Frauen (die meist direkt den Noir-Thrillern der 40er Jahre entnommen scheinen) spinnt, fügt er dem nichts Neues hinzu. Die Protagonisten ergehen sich in übelsten Beleidigungen gegen Schwarze, Juden, Frauen, Schwule, Mexikaner, Japaner und Chinesen, was sicherlich dem Jargon beim LAPD der 40er und 50er Jahre entspricht, was aber auf 1000 Seiten irgendwann ermüdend, da es zur Charakterisierung irgendwann auch nichts mehr beiträgt.
Anders als in früheren Werken, wird die Gewalt nicht mehr ganz so explizit ausgewalzt, anders als in den letzten Werken, hat Ellroy erstaunlicherweise den Stakkato- oder Telegramm-Stil, von dem bei ihm gern die Rede ist und der sein Schreiben bisher so eigen und charakteristisch machte, zurückgeschraubt. Es gibt sogar komplett gefüllte Seiten. Man mag´s kaum glauben. Einzig die Figur des Hideo Ashida, jener junge Forensiker, der unter Smith´ Anleitung schnell lernt, wie man seine eigenen Erkundungen und die eigene Agenda verfolgt und daß man eigentlich nur auf sich selbst vertrauen darf, diese Figur könnte man als neu im Kosmos des James Ellroy bezeichnen. Aber – es wurde soeben angedeutet – auch sie lässt ihre moralischen und ethischen Ambitionen schnell hinter sich und wird zu eben jenem Zyniker, der man wohl sein muß, um im Sumpf des LAPD nach Ellroy zu überleben. Nur die Gewalt, also die unvermittelte Gewalt, hat er von Smith noch nicht übernommen. Da soeben der 2. Band – DIESER STURM (2919) – des neuen L.A.-Quartetts erschienen ist und Ashida erneut eine tragende Rolle spielt, ist aber davon auszugehen, daß der junge Mann auch die Hürde der Gewalt noch nehmen wird. Man darf gespannt sein.
Ellroy ist nichts für zartbesaitete Gemüter, das war er nie. Man muß die Gewalt und den Zynismus aushalten, man muß sich für das Zeitkolorit interessieren, man muß bereit sein, all diesen verschlungenen Pfaden der Handlungen zu folgen und eine Fülle an Personal in Kauf nehmen. Meist wird man dafür mit einem genau recherchierten und lebendigen Gesellschafts- und Zeitportrait belohnt. Und mit Spannung. Ellroy schreibt Noir-Thriller, ohne Frage. Die eigentliche Frage lautet: Hat er es noch drauf, den Leser noch einmal mitzunehmen in die Höllen von Los Angeles? Nimmt man PERFIDIA als Ausgangspunkt, könnten Zweifel aufkommen. So muß man Ellroy-Einsteiger warnen, die Lektüre nicht unbedingt mit diesem Band zu beginnen; als alteingesessener Ellroy-Leser sollte man warten, bis DIESER STURM als Taschenbuch erscheint und ihm dann eine weitere Chance geben. Wer weiß, vielleicht jazzt er sich doch noch einmal in den eigenen Sound hinein, ohne sich selbst zu zitieren oder gar zu kopieren, und vielleicht wächst er an der Aufgabe, die er sich gestellt hat.
PERFIDIA kann leider noch nicht überzeugen, daß der Autor diese Kraft noch hat.
August 11, 2015
I have to give this book two stars because THE BLACK DAHLIA and LA CONFIDENTIAL are the best crime novels ever written. James Ellroy is my hero and always will be, no matter how much he's gone down hill since then.
But if those two books were STICKY FINGERS and EXILE ON MAIN STREET, PERFIDIA isn't even GOAT'S HEAD SOUP.
I don't even know where to begin with this review. Hundreds upon hundreds of things that just didn't ring true, weirdly clueless dialogue, insanely implausible plot points, characters who start out over the top and just get more and more ridiculous over time. Ellroy favorites (like Dudley Smith) and Ellroy failures (like Kay Lake) are resurrected and forced to travesty themselves with scant regard to probability and common sense. Over and over.
Dudley Smith used to be an enticing enigma, a menacing and mysterious embodiment of evil. In the classic Ellroy universe, he's somewhere between Darth Vader and Sauron, only cooler than both of them. But you know, a little Dudley goes a long way. When you don't know much about him, he's awe-inspiring. In this book you know too much. Much too much information! A cop who terrifies other cops can't be shown smoking opium, popping Benzedrine, and talking to imaginary wolves, and at the same time romancing real life movie legend Bette Davis. The more Dudley does the less Dudley he becomes. Remember when he was subtle and malignant? Now he's a scenery chewing psycho, shooting Japs in broad daylight and laughing maniacally while making vague noises about land grabs and plastic surgery schemes.
I just don't want to talk about the "plot" of this novel. It made no sense. Let's capture Japanese citizens and give them plastic surgery so they all look Chinese. Then we can steal their businesses and blame it on the mysterious werewolf killer who really works for Joe Kennedy, or Harry Cohn, or Herbert Hoover, or . . .
I miss the days when you could read James Ellroy without cracking up laughing every five pages.
Oh, and how about that Kay Lake? Has there ever been a less convincing femme fatale? Reading her "diary" is the worst part of this book. The crazed cops and confused conspiracies are at least mildly amusing, in a camp way. But Kay Lake is so tiresome, so "dig how cool I am," so unconvincing as a seductress, a martyr, a saint, a tough girl, a patriot, a traitor . . . she just remains opaque from every angle. I wish someone could have given her the tea with the slow-acting Japanese poison, and then fed her to the all-Japanese werewolf squad!
Speaking of the Japanese, I understand Ellroy is too hopped up on his own private obsessions to bother with basic research, or external reality. But I just had to take a break from the book when he mentioned "Buddhist rituals from 2000 BC." Buddha wasn't born till 300 AD, in India. His teachings didn't reach Japan till three hundred years later, around 600 AD. Talk about phoning it in!
I can't even begin to describe how fake and stupid the World War II intrigue stuff is. A 12 year-old kid would ridicule the absurdities. Japanese subs come and go like downtown buses, everyone in LA is a Jap sympathizer, yet the moment our heroes capture a Jap sub they just "blow it up" on their own initiative, murdering the Japanese sailors inside. Gee, no chance the U.S. Navy might like to look at the sub? No chance anyone other than maniacal cops who talk to imaginary wolves on Benzedrine might want to interview the sailors?
Hundreds of pages of Ellroy goofing on the forbidden thrills of illicit plastic surgery, or the sexually charged agonies of a hopeless alcoholic trying to dry himself out. Maybe five pages of real crime, real racial violence, and real-life police work.
I think everyone who reads this book to the end should get to eat free for one year at Ace Kwan's!
But if those two books were STICKY FINGERS and EXILE ON MAIN STREET, PERFIDIA isn't even GOAT'S HEAD SOUP.
I don't even know where to begin with this review. Hundreds upon hundreds of things that just didn't ring true, weirdly clueless dialogue, insanely implausible plot points, characters who start out over the top and just get more and more ridiculous over time. Ellroy favorites (like Dudley Smith) and Ellroy failures (like Kay Lake) are resurrected and forced to travesty themselves with scant regard to probability and common sense. Over and over.
Dudley Smith used to be an enticing enigma, a menacing and mysterious embodiment of evil. In the classic Ellroy universe, he's somewhere between Darth Vader and Sauron, only cooler than both of them. But you know, a little Dudley goes a long way. When you don't know much about him, he's awe-inspiring. In this book you know too much. Much too much information! A cop who terrifies other cops can't be shown smoking opium, popping Benzedrine, and talking to imaginary wolves, and at the same time romancing real life movie legend Bette Davis. The more Dudley does the less Dudley he becomes. Remember when he was subtle and malignant? Now he's a scenery chewing psycho, shooting Japs in broad daylight and laughing maniacally while making vague noises about land grabs and plastic surgery schemes.
I just don't want to talk about the "plot" of this novel. It made no sense. Let's capture Japanese citizens and give them plastic surgery so they all look Chinese. Then we can steal their businesses and blame it on the mysterious werewolf killer who really works for Joe Kennedy, or Harry Cohn, or Herbert Hoover, or . . .
I miss the days when you could read James Ellroy without cracking up laughing every five pages.
Oh, and how about that Kay Lake? Has there ever been a less convincing femme fatale? Reading her "diary" is the worst part of this book. The crazed cops and confused conspiracies are at least mildly amusing, in a camp way. But Kay Lake is so tiresome, so "dig how cool I am," so unconvincing as a seductress, a martyr, a saint, a tough girl, a patriot, a traitor . . . she just remains opaque from every angle. I wish someone could have given her the tea with the slow-acting Japanese poison, and then fed her to the all-Japanese werewolf squad!
Speaking of the Japanese, I understand Ellroy is too hopped up on his own private obsessions to bother with basic research, or external reality. But I just had to take a break from the book when he mentioned "Buddhist rituals from 2000 BC." Buddha wasn't born till 300 AD, in India. His teachings didn't reach Japan till three hundred years later, around 600 AD. Talk about phoning it in!
I can't even begin to describe how fake and stupid the World War II intrigue stuff is. A 12 year-old kid would ridicule the absurdities. Japanese subs come and go like downtown buses, everyone in LA is a Jap sympathizer, yet the moment our heroes capture a Jap sub they just "blow it up" on their own initiative, murdering the Japanese sailors inside. Gee, no chance the U.S. Navy might like to look at the sub? No chance anyone other than maniacal cops who talk to imaginary wolves on Benzedrine might want to interview the sailors?
Hundreds of pages of Ellroy goofing on the forbidden thrills of illicit plastic surgery, or the sexually charged agonies of a hopeless alcoholic trying to dry himself out. Maybe five pages of real crime, real racial violence, and real-life police work.
I think everyone who reads this book to the end should get to eat free for one year at Ace Kwan's!
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