Hollywood Nocturnes

Hollywood Nocturnes is a collection of seven mystery stories mostly set in the Hollywood scene of the 1940's & 1950's. Many of these stories are clearly inspired by the true crime case of Elizabeth Short aka The Black Dahlia. These stories show Ellroy at his best as an author of Hollywood mystery stories and are a must for anyone wanting to escape into a neatly done mystery.

Ellroy is a love/hate man. Love him or hate him, there isn't much in between. I do recommmend this as a starter book of Ellroy. The shorrt stories are easy to pick up, especially if you've begun from viewing the movie LA Confidential. If these are like pie to you, then move on to the books.

This is the second book that I have read by Ellroy and I am very happy with it. The short stories read quick and the action jumps from the pages. Ellroy is the Carravagio of authors. I highly reccomend!

James Ellroy has done it again with the gritty, violent and disturbing collection of short stories, "Hollywood Nocturnes". My favorites were "Dial Axminster 6-400", "Since I Don't Have You", and "Dick Contino's Blues". All were wonderfully exciting as the always splendid Ellroy whips out razor-sharp prose about dirty cops, femme fatales, and smart-ass private investigators. A wonderful collection and another win for the best crime writer out there today, James Ellroy.

After reading about Ellroy's complicated novels during promotions for "L. A. Confidential" I thought I would start with some of his short stories. The longest is 'Dick Contino's Blues' which is told in a hipster tone that is very different from the following 5 stories. I was then very satisfied by the next story "High Darktown" which is exactly what I had hoped for. Gritty, smart and fast. I loved that story alot. The others never lived up to "High Darktown". Several subjects are started that appeared in L. A. Confidential, such as a story about Mickey Cohen and Howard Hughes called 'Gravey Train' which is told by Buzz Meeks in old age.