James Ellroy's Reading List

The Los Angeles crime novelist, whose new book is “This Storm,” is no fan of Cormac McCarthy’s work: “McCarthy fails to employ quotation marks. Neither did William Faulkner, another cat I don’t dig.”

Open in WellRead Daily app →

By the Book: James Ellroy (2019)

NYT By the Book column (2019-06-06).

Source: www.nytimes.com

Compulsion

Meyer Levin · Buy on Amazon

"Compulsion, the 1956 novel by Meyer Levin. I've read it six or seven times, over the years. Man, what a great period novel! Man, what a great depiction of 1924 Chicago! Man, what a great portrayal of two world-class psychopaths!"

True Confessions

John Gregory Dunne · Buy on Amazon

"I would point readers to John Gregory Dunne's 1977 classic, True Confessions. The language is explosive. It's a pulsating potpourri of racial invective, flamboyant street talk, cop rebop, and the wiiiiiiild American idiom at its most profane."

Libra

Don DeLillo · Buy on Amazon

"Libra, DeLillo's book on the J.F.K.-hit conspiracy, knocked me on my ass."

Mrs. Paine's Garage

Thomas Mallon · Buy on Amazon

"Mallon's nonfiction book Mrs. Paine's Garage converted me to the lone gunman view of history."

Watergate

Thomas Mallon · Buy on Amazon

"The novel Watergate, by Thomas Mallon. The themes are the price of official misconduct and the consequences of sin. The overarching message is REPENT!!!"

Suggest an update?