Book Review: My Dark Places by James Ellroy

Murder, memory, loss, and anguish — all the stuff of crime fiction and tragedy. It is the subject matter of novelist James Ellroy, whose literary career has garnered him praise from the national press, and whose novel L.A. Confidential became a critically acclaimed film. But in My Dark Places, Ellroy throws the reader an unexpected twist. This book is about the killing of his own mother, whom Ellroy lost when he was 10. It was the single incident that propelled Ellroy through a life as an introverted child, a teen criminal, a con, a drug addict, and finally a writer.

But even as Ellroy dredges his tortured life from the ashes, his mother's ghost is never far behind. He longs for her, dreams about her, and she insinuated herself into every waking moment of his life.

My Dark Places is a memoir, crime story, love song, and a cry in the dark. Jean Ellroy was very much like a character in a noir novel. A woman of duplicity, torn between two lives, she was subdued and distant with her son, and acted more as a disciplinarian than loving mother. In her other life she was a secret alcoholic, habitually drawn to anonymous sex with violent men. One of those men killed her on June 22, 1958. It was the single experience that rent the fabric of James Ellroy's life. He spent the next 36 years both running from her ghost, and recreating her life.

As soon as he was able, Ellroy disappeared into the underworld. He was his mother's son, after all. She drank, he grew up and did eight balls and speed. She hung with criminals, he became one. She picked up men in bars and had one-night stands, he met women, screwed them, dumped them, and moved along. When the drugs and the sex and the crime failed, Ellroy even reconstituted himself as a sober, successful writer. Nothing healed that wound that was his mother. He desired her, despised her, and finally decided to investigate the case himself, hoping in this way, to reclaim her. What happened was an odyssey of obsession and redemption, but not peace.

Article Author: Lisa Alvarado

Lisa Alvarado is a poet, novelist, and performance artist. She is the author of The Housekeeper's Diary, Reclamo, and Sister Chicas. In 2007, Sister Chicas was the 2nd place winner of the Mariposa/International Latino Book Award for Best 1st Novel in English. …

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