History Creator / JamesEllroy

He's currently at work on the ''L.A. Quintet'', which returns to the classic Los Angeles setting while rewinding the clock to the World War 2 years. The first two books, ''Literature/{{Perfidia}}'' and ''Literature/ThisStorm'', are linked below. This has since turned into a Freddy Otash detour as his novels since 2021 - ''Literature/Widespread Panic'' and ''The Enchanters'' - have focused on the Hollyweird fixer's misadventures, although he has said that ''The Enchanters'' is an entry in the ''L.A. Quintet'' series, despite taking the narrative forward two decades.

He's currently at work on the ''L.A. Quintet'', which returns to the classic Los Angeles setting while rewinding the clock to the World War 2 years. The first two books, ''Literature/{{Perfidia}}'' and ''Literature/ThisStorm'', are linked below. This has since turned into a Freddy Otash detour as his novels since 2021 - Widespread Panic and The Enchanters - have focused on the Hollyweird fixer's misadventures, although ''The Enchanters'' has been stated to be in the ''L.A. Quintet'' series, despite taking the narrative forward two decades.

He's currently at work on the ''L.A. Quintet'', which returns to the classic Los Angeles setting while rewinding the clock to the World War 2 years. The first two books, ''Literature/{{Perfidia}}'' and ''Literature/ThisStorm'', are linked below. This has since turned into a Freddy Otash detour as his novels since 2021 - Widespread Panic and The Enchanters - have focused on the Hollyweird fixer's misadventures.

He's currently at work on the Second LA Quartet, which returns to the classic Los Angeles setting while rewinding the clock to the World War 2 years. The first two books, ''Literature/{{Perfidia}}'' and ''Literature/ThisStorm'', are linked below. This has since turned into a Freddy Otash detour as his novels since 2021 - Widespread Panic and The Enchanters - have focused on the Hollyweird fixer's misadventures.

!!!Second L.A. Quartet

* ''The Enchanters''

His most famous series is the ''Literature/TheLAQuartet'', a collection of four hardboiled detective novels set in Los Angeles during the post-war years. These four books -- ''Film/TheBlackDahlia'', ''Literature/TheBigNowhere'', ''Literature/LAConfidential'', and ''Literature/WhiteJazz'' -- defined noir in the minds of many modern readers, and became kind of the canonical take on the Golden Age of Hollywood. In them, Ellroy looked to expose the dark underbelly of the glittering LA facade, telling stories of elaborate, often sickening conspiracies that swallowed whole the lives of innocent men and women. The books occupy a shared continuity, with many characters appearing in multiple novels, but they're also standalone stories that don't require knowledge of the previous books to understand.

* PlotHole: ''Perfidia'' reveals that [[spoiler:Dudley Smith is Elizabeth Short's real father. Given his complete absence in ''The Black Dahlia'' there's going to have to be some explaining as to whether he could have prevented, solved or instigated her murder. A man of his stature could not have just not known about one of the most infamous real-life killings in history.]]

* PlotHole: ''Perfidia'' reveals that [[spoiler:Dudley Smith is Elizabeth Short's real father. Given his complete absence in ''The Black Dahlia'' there's going to have to be some explaining as to whether he could have prevented, solved or instigated her murder. A man of his stature could not have just not known about one of the most infamous real-life killings in history.]]

He's currently at work on the Second LA Quartet, which returns to the classic Los Angeles setting while rewinding the clock to the World War 2 years. The first two books, ''Literature/{{Perfidia}}'' and ''Literature/ThisStorm'', are linked below.

Ellroy followed the Quartet with the Underworld USA series -- ''Literature/AmericanTabloid,'' ''Literature/TheColdSixThousand'' and ''Literature/BloodsARover.'' It was as cynical and conspiratorial as the Quartet, but it played out on a grander geopolitical stage, weaving in high-level American politics and international diplomacy from the years 1968 to 1972.

Ellroy followed the Quartet with the Underworld USA series -- ''Literature/AmericanTabloid,'' ''Literature/TheColdSixThousand'' and ''Literature/BloodsARover.'' It was as cynical and conspiratorial as the Quartet, but it played out on a grander geopolitical stage, weaving in high-level American politics and international diplomacy from the years 1960 to 1973.

** Ditto for ''L.A. Quartet'' really, but there at least every book featured a stone-cold psycho killer and [[VillainWithGoodPublicity Dudley]] [[GreaterScopeVillain Smith]] so the "heroes" looked halfway-decent by comparison.

* KillEmAll: There's pretty much no one left standing by the end of [[spoiler: ''Blood's a Rover'']].

His most famous series is ''Literature/TheLAQuartet'', a collection of four hardboiled detective novels set in Los Angeles during the post-war years. These four books -- ''Film/TheBlackDahlia'', ''Literature/TheBigNowhere'', ''Literature/LAConfidential'', and ''Literature/WhiteJazz'' -- defined noir in the minds of many modern readers, and became kind of the canonical take on the Golden Age of Hollywood. In them, Ellroy looked to expose the dark underbelly of the glittering LA facade, telling stories of elaborate, often sickening conspiracies that swallowed whole the lives of innocent men and women. The books occupy a shared continuity, with many characters appearing in multiple novels, but they're also standalone stories that don't require knowledge of the previous books to understand.

* VillainProtagonist: The protagonists of the Underworld USA trilogy are a motley collection of extortionists, dope peddlers, mercenaries, con men, and assassins.

His most famous series is ''Literature/TheLAQuartet, a collection of four hardboiled detective novels set in Los Angeles during the post-war years. These four books -- ''Film/TheBlackDahlia'', ''Literature/TheBigNowhere'', ''Literature/LAConfidential'', and ''Literature/WhiteJazz'' -- defined noir in the minds of many modern readers, and became kind of the canonical take on the Golden Age of Hollywood. In them, Ellroy looked to expose the dark underbelly of the glittering LA facade, telling stories of elaborate, often sickening conspiracies that swallowed whole the lives of innocent men and women. The books occupy a shared continuity, with many characters appearing in multiple novels, but they're also standalone stories that don't require knowledge of the previous books to understand.

His most famous series is the L.A. Quartet, a collection of four hardboiled detective novels set in Los Angeles during the post-war years. These four books -- ''Film/TheBlackDahlia'', ''Literature/TheBigNowhere'', ''Literature/LAConfidential'', and ''Literature/WhiteJazz'' -- defined noir in the minds of many modern readers, and became kind of the canonical take on the Golden Age of Hollywood. In them, Ellroy looked to expose the dark underbelly of the glittering LA facade, telling stories of elaborate, often sickening conspiracies that swallowed whole the lives of innocent men and women. The books occupy a shared continuity, with many characters appearing in multiple novels, but they're also standalone stories that don't require knowledge of the previous books to understand.

!!!L.A. Quartet

Ellroy is also set to narrate a TrueCrime podcast, ''Hollywood Death Trip,'' where he recounts some of the more famous murder mysteries in Hollywood history.

His books include lots of BlackAndGrayMorality and DeliberateValuesDissonance, as well as LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters. Ellroy's novels are, invariably, brutal and violent, suffused with a jaundiced, cynical, world-weary tone. Their protagonists - almost always, though not exclusively, men - are usually desperate scrabblers and {{Anti Hero}}es at best. Ellroy's narratives feature intricate, dense plots that require flow charts and extensive notes to keep track of.

** Given his story arc so far [[spoiler: chances are he was high as a kite during the whole timeframe of the investigation.]]

--->--'''James Ellroy'''

-->''The essential contention of the Underworld USA trilogy ... is that America was never innocent. Here's the lineage: America was founded on a bedrock of racism, slaughter of the indigenous people, slavery, religious lunacy ... and nations are never innocent. Let alone nations as powerful as our beloved fatherland. What you have in ''The Cold Six Thousand'' — which covers the years '63 to '68 — is that last gasp of pre-public-accountability America where the [[RedScare anti-communist mandate]] justified [[TheGovernment virtually any action]]. And it wasn't [[WhoShotJFK Kennedy's death]] that engendered mass skepticism. It was the protracted horror of the [[UsefulNotes/TheVietnamWar Vietnamese war]].''
--->-- James Ellroy