Like the supermarket rags in the title, this James Elroy novel is loaded with grandiose stories, half truths and more conspiracy theories than an Oliver Stone wet dream. It rewrites history in a manner akin to the Lone Gunmen in the X-Files and is a thoroughly enjoyable experience.
It is filled with wall to wall celebrities. There are politicians (John F.and Robert Kenney, J Edgar Hoover), flashy millionaires (Howard Hughes) and mobsters galore (Santo Traficante, Jack Ruby, etc). It retells the rise to power of JFK through a myriad of conspiracies, ending with the ultimate conspiracy, the assassination of JFK.
It is filled with bits of history and fact, but also unproven conspiracies and outright fabrications. I am not a historian, so my knowledge of the time period, while pretty good, is by no means complete. I suspect this is true for the majority of Americans. None of us know exactly what happened the day JFK was assassinated. There are a lot of theories floating around, and they all sort of blend together after awhile. Elroy uses this to his advantage.
For example, it is generally accepted that John F Kennedy had affairs. During the Clinton scandals numerous journalists touted this as absolute truth, though I’ve never once seen any hard data confirming the information. Before anyone sends in the hard data, understand that whether or not JFK did have affairs is beyond the point. As a culture we believe it, it is accepted as fact. There are many more rumors and flat out lies, that as a culture we know, that we have heard for the umpteenth time, that it feels like the truth. Elroy writes all of these things as hard truths, and then kicks them up several notches. Here, JFK not only has a few casual affairs, but is an oversexed hound dog. He employs multiple persons to set him up with one night stands at every campaign stop, for every night of the week.
Likewise such fascinating conspiracies of the American group mind such as the CIA/Mob collaboration to assassinate Fidel Catro, the CIA sanctioning of heroin sells to support this collaboration,. Or Joe Kennedy’s mob ties, and Jack Ruby’s collaboration with the JFK conspiracy, are all made concrete facts, and punctuated with exclamation marks, ad infinitum.
Article comments
1 - Nick Jones
American Tabloid is my second-favorite Ellroy novel (L.A. Confidential being the first). I love the twists and turns the three lead characters take as the novel progresses, the (fictional) eavesdropping on the conversations of J. Edgar Hoover, JFK, Howard Hughes, et al., the raw and explicit violence of violent men.
The sequel, The Cold Six Thousand, while following new and old characters up to the assasination of Bobby Kennedy, is much less accomplished, and crosses over the line where you start to wonder if the racism of the characters is shared by Ellroy himself.
2 - DrPat
If I were totally cynical, I would say that your point (There aren’t any good guys in this novel. Anybody who starts out with anything close to a normal set of morals has completely lost them by story’s end...) comes as no surprise - the book is about tabloid journalism and politicians, after all...
3 - HW Saxton
James Ellroy does that same thing with
several historical characters in the L.A
trilogy (Black Dahlia,The Big Nowhere &
L.A. Confidential).The characters are
either barely disguised or he takes off
on some trivia point involving that
person and exxagerates it almost to the
point of fiction. Makes for some good
reading at times as it can be funny and
at other times it's just irritating as
hell. I used to like Ellroy but upon re-
reading the three mentioned above very
recently I don't think he holds up well.
Rather re-read my Chandler books for the
umpteenth times.
4 - Mat Brewster
I'm right in the middle of the Cold Six Thousand right now and am finding it a chore to get through. His "terse" style is just irritating by this point. I just want to scream write a sentence longer than four words!
So, would you recommend the LA trilogy HW? I've heard good things about it, but am feeling a little burned out trying to get through TCST.