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James Ellroy was born Lee Earle Ellroy on March 4, 1948 in Los Angeles, California. he is best known for his distinctive style of writing in which he frequently omits connecting words and uses short, choppy sentences. Ellroy’s most notable works are in the crime fiction and historical fiction genres, though he has occasionally ventured into some areas himself.
personal life ellroy lived the first years of his life in los angeles, california with his parents, geneva (who was a nurse) and armand (who was an accountant). after his parents’ divorce, ellroy was forced to move with his mother to el monte, california. As it turned out, that would be the first chapter of his unfortunate childhood. When Ellroy was 10 years old, Geneva (his mother) was brutally raped and murdered, in a case that remains unsolved to this day. After his mother’s murder, Ellroy suffered from clinical depression and adverse emotions throughout his childhood. during his 20 years, his life was no better. he began to drink heavily and was often homeless or in jail for petty crimes such as shoplifting or robbery. given all that he had seen in his tender age, his life seemed full of emptiness and he sought solace in what he believed would act as a distraction from memories of his past. as if that wasn’t enough, he developed an abscess in his lung, large enough to compare to a large man’s fist. After successfully recovering, that close call opened her eyes and Ellroy stopped drinking and became a golf caddy. he also began studying for a career in writing at the same time. he caddyed in the morning and wrote in the afternoon. Ellroy eventually stopped caddying until his fifth book was published. James Ellroy is still active on the literary scene today, enjoying enormous popularity in the United States and France. he recently he made important donations to the victims of the terrorist attacks in paris.
writing career ellroy’s devastating childhood has been a major influence on his writing style. not surprisingly, most of his books are crime, mystery, or noir fiction. Another important event that shaped Ellroy’s writing career was Jack Webb’s book “The Badge”, which was an early birthday present from his father. This book tells of sensational cases from the files of the Los Angeles Police Department, a subject Ellroy would eventually write about in his future books. In 1981, Ellroy’s first novel, Brown’s Requiem, was published. narrated the story of a detective story, which was based on his own experience as a caddy. some of his other early books were also heavily influenced by his early life. “Underground” and “Road Killer” were added to his repertoire of early mystery novels. It wouldn’t be until his successful “The Lloyd Hopkins” trilogy that he would make a name for himself and gain a cult following. The trilogy consisted of “Blood on the Moon”, “Because the Night” and “Suicide Hill” which would tell the story of Lloyd Hopkins, a highly intelligent and sexually addicted detective from the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD). However, it would not be until “The Quarter” Elliot achieved critical and commercial success. the “l.a quarter” consisted of “the black dahlia”, “the big nowhere”, “l.a confidential” and “white jazz” and were a sequence of crime novels. More importantly, they represented the transformation of Lory’s writing style from noir fiction to the metafiction of historiography. One of his most notable novels, The “Black Dahlia” fused the real-life murder of Elizabeth Short and the fictional police officers investigating her murder. Being well recognized in the world of literature, Ellroy launched “American Tabloid” in 1995 to critical acclaim, being named Time Magazine’s Fiction Book of the Year. It described the “secret history” of the United States in the 20th century. Following the critical success of the American Tabloid, Elliot published his follow-up “The Cold Six Thousand” which became a bestseller. The third and final novel in this trilogy (referred to as the Underworld USA Trilogy) was published in 2009 under the title “Blood’s a Rover”. One of Elliot’s most personally important books was his autobiography, My Dark Places, which is based on memories of his mother’s murder. he along with a reporter named frank c. Girardot and Detective Bill Stoner, Ellroy gathered the LAPD files on his mother’s murder and after fifteen months dropped the case believing a suspect must be dead by now. many of ellroy’s books have been adapted to the seventh art. the most prominent was “the confidential” which was released in 1997 and received not only positive reviews, but also a great response from the public, grossing more than 100 million dollars at the box office. it has received surprising reviews as one of the “greatest movies of all time”. Ellroy described this film as “the best thing that ever happened to me in my career that I had absolutely nothing to do with.”
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Other notable adoptions included the less commercial hit “Black Dahlia”, which received mixed reviews from critics. This film had an hour removed from the final cut due to the negative reviews Ellroy himself gave the production company. there were other books that were made into movies like “blood on the moon” which was adapted as the “cop” movie, which ellroy called a “disappointment”, and “brown’s requiem”, “killer on the road” and “silent terror”. However, in addition to the commercial success of “The Confidential,” Ellroy was generally disappointed by these adaptations, saying in 2009 that “all film adaptations of my books are dead,” and later in 2012 he went further by saying that Movie studios can do what they want with her books as long as they pay her. Today, Ellroy still has a legacy that continues to permeate American culture. With her well-known trilogies along with her essays, she forever changed the crime novel genre. Thanks to his works, documentaries, movies and even television programs have emerged. Today he is a world-renowned author who is still active and known in different parts of the world in addition to the United States. For example Lo, he is also well known in Europe, especially in France.
like many other authors who have made a name for themselves in the literary industry, james ellroy’s legacy will live on forever, not only because of his prowess as an author, but also because he overcame insurmountable odds to make himself a Name.
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