- Paperback: 352 pages
- Publisher: Arrow Books Ltd; New edition edition (7 Sep 1995)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0099893207
- ISBN-13: 978-0099893202
- Product Dimensions: 19.4 x 13 x 3.4 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (37 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 14,076 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
American Tabloid
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More About the Author
Product Description
Savkar Altinel, Sunday Telegraph
'Intense and flamboyant . . . excellent. . . one emerges breathless, shaken and ready to change one's view of recent American history'
Marcel Berlins, Times
'Brilliant and appalling. It is deeply repelling portraiture, yet mesmerising'
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
18 of 19 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
If ytou have any interest at all in crime writing or the America of the 1950's and 60's you have to read this book. I read the Black Dahlia several years ago and enjoyed it, but it was, in my opinion, nothing compared to this. I truly believe this to be amnong the very best (if not THE best)fiction I have read. And I have read a couple of books a month for many years. A superbly dark, shocking, intriguing novel. The manner in which the author binds together real historical characters with fictional ones, real documented events with invented, and real relationships and conversations with new is truly stunning
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Mass Market Paperback
History has always been written by the victors - and they have the tendency to iron-out all its bloody details and hide all their dirty secrets. This a TRUE CLASSIC: imagine a history book that reads like a tabloid. Every story up close and personal, complete with every gory detail described. IN CINEMASCOPE & TECHNICOLOR.
The dirty making of the Kennedy fortune. Hoover as a hypochondriac cross-dressing extortionist. Everybody wiretapping everybody. The Camelot President clocked at 6 minutes. The Mob rigs the election for said President; invades Cuba with clansmen and Castro's exiles in blood-lust frenzy; gets burned - and gets even the only way it knows how. And in the middle of it all, two FBI agents trapped in a downwards spiral of serving multiple masters.
JAMES ELLROY does not pretend to write the dark side: he has barely escaped it himself and knows all its intoxicating scents and shadows. Read for the plausible details of history's margins. Enjoy the staccato prose of natural wit, verbatim FBI communication files and 50's Tabloid lingo.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!!
The dirty making of the Kennedy fortune. Hoover as a hypochondriac cross-dressing extortionist. Everybody wiretapping everybody. The Camelot President clocked at 6 minutes. The Mob rigs the election for said President; invades Cuba with clansmen and Castro's exiles in blood-lust frenzy; gets burned - and gets even the only way it knows how. And in the middle of it all, two FBI agents trapped in a downwards spiral of serving multiple masters.
JAMES ELLROY does not pretend to write the dark side: he has barely escaped it himself and knows all its intoxicating scents and shadows. Read for the plausible details of history's margins. Enjoy the staccato prose of natural wit, verbatim FBI communication files and 50's Tabloid lingo.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!!
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
If there is a recent candidate, then this is the one. Ellroy's style in this is by far superior to what he was trying to do in White Jazz, where the brevity was stiltedly relentless. Here, the sentences are longer - just enough so. The point is that the style suits the material absolutely perfect.
This is a great novel also in content. So you thought you knew what happened on November 22nd? Well, you did. What you could not know, however, is HOW it got to be like that and with WHOM. Far more horrific then any one of us could have possibly imagined...
This is a great novel not only because of style and content but also because of characterisation. You could say it is because the characters are so horrible they need no introduction or writing up, but I would suggest it is because Ellroy has got inside his subject and writing out toward us - no mean feat when you consider the enormity of his subject matter.
Let me put it this way: forget all your prissy Booker what's it contentenders and winners - this is the real deal.
This is a great novel also in content. So you thought you knew what happened on November 22nd? Well, you did. What you could not know, however, is HOW it got to be like that and with WHOM. Far more horrific then any one of us could have possibly imagined...
This is a great novel not only because of style and content but also because of characterisation. You could say it is because the characters are so horrible they need no introduction or writing up, but I would suggest it is because Ellroy has got inside his subject and writing out toward us - no mean feat when you consider the enormity of his subject matter.
Let me put it this way: forget all your prissy Booker what's it contentenders and winners - this is the real deal.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
American Tabloid - Lords of the Sting? (Apologies to JRT)
Welcome to the maelstrom. America pre Kennedy assasination - briefly, Feds in bed with the mob, Taps before Watergate... Read more
Published 2 months ago by Man from poundstretcher
Corruption and Violence
They were there. The nearly history men. Men who worked in the background during the 50's and 60's. Hoffa, Hoover, Bobby K and Howard Hughes. They were the main players. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Syriat
Very stylish but not that thrilling
There's a lot to like about this book. First off there's the ingenuity of the plot which basically brings together the main elements of the most popular JFK assassination... Read more
Published 4 months ago by Mr Gordon Davidson
Pure Genius
Powerfully vivid insight expressed with uniquely succinct precision.
The English language is wasted on anyone who isn't awe-struck by this book!
The English language is wasted on anyone who isn't awe-struck by this book!
Published 5 months ago by R. W. M. Lally
"all the whores hustle, and all the hustlers whore" PJ Harvey
Welcome to the black heart of the real world.
If you read this book when you are too young you will think the world can't truly be this debased and may not... Read more
If you read this book when you are too young you will think the world can't truly be this debased and may not... Read more
Published 7 months ago by LR
An Unreserved 5* - my book of the year @ halfway stage
Other reviews give you far more granularity than mine will do.
And outline the style, plot and nature of this quasi fiction - I say quasi as some of the events described are a... Read more
And outline the style, plot and nature of this quasi fiction - I say quasi as some of the events described are a... Read more
Published 11 months ago by Ginola14
Ellroy on a huge canvas...
I love Ellroy and I love his style. Well, most of the time. I don't think it works so well when he's writing non-fiction, but when it's part of a huge, labyrinthine plot like this... Read more
Published 12 months ago by Nicole Y
Heavy going, but worth it
I steer clear of blockbuster novels, particularly when they are billed as part of a series, and I am not fond of modern american writing, finding it formulaic and repetitive. Read more
Published 13 months ago by Old Socialist
Thrilling
I haven't read this yet, as I wanted to have the complete trilogy before I started reading, but if it is half as good as Ellroy's L.A. Read more
Published 23 months ago by I. Martinez Almeida Fl
Gut Wrenching Reading
This novel about secret governmental departments and their unexpected activities is superbly written and rivets the reader to each page. Read more
Published on 17 May 2010 by Ila France Porcher, author of My Sunset Rendezvous
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