general

American Psycho is the best black humor book i have ever read. Of course, if i failed to mention about the gory details, the right atmosphere is not set while the reader is reading this book. The sudden shifts of paradigm from an average successful businessman to a psychotic killer is eerie and gut-wrenching. This book has no plot to it. But, that in itself should not be the basis for judging it's entertainment factor! This book is a "beautiful" satire criticizing the whole yuppie lifestyle in New York's Manhatten during the "Manhatten Era" in the 80's. Its about a guy - Patrick Bateman who knows he is good-looking and is 'well-tanned' living in New York. He thinks that all the girls like him because he's got the looks, green bucks, and the styles. But, the quirky part is, he's into serial killers and he quotes one of them while he was talking ot his friends about the usual stuff - 'women.' He 'jokes' about one serial killer, wisonsin in the fifties - Ed Gein, "He said, 'when i see a pretty girl walking down the street I think two things. One part of me wants to take her out and talk to her and be real nice and sweet and treat her right...the other part wonders what her head would look like on a stick." According to the blurb, it's all a part of his "American Dream" which is unrevealed as yet which is for me to know and for u to find out~!!

I don't think I have ever read a better character portrayal than the one presented in American Psycho. Ellis is so skilled at bringing Patrick Bateman to life that it can be disturbing to read. I wouldn't be surprised if this book has become a standard text for criminologists at FBI training centers. On one level, Bateman is the embodiment of evil, on another, he is representative of a superficial mindset that Ellis obviously knows and has studied very well. Ellis is out to have some fun by forging these two aspects together in one person, explaining homicidal rage as an extension of vanity and pathological materialism. Bateman's crowd is the smart set, not exactly hip, at the top of the social rung of Manhattan; they are young, rich and educated. The conversations Ellis records are very funny. He exaggerates manners and employs a style that approaches slapstick. The conversations are so convincing, so well wrought, that they have a life of their own, echoing those of our own world. It is a powerful satire that strikes at the very core of our being. We have all encountered these people at one time or another and have probably even acted in similar fashion ourselves. It is worth reflecting on to understand why Ellis made the choices he did in writing this book, why he chose a serial killer to analyze this pathology and why he includes several graphic passages of unimaginable cruelty. To say the book is a criticism of 80s Wall Street greed is simplistic; Wall Street is Wall Street, the same then as it is now and always has been. Ellis is making a much larger indictment of society, and the Wall Street characters are merely the most convenient targets, and perhaps the best (worst) exemplars of what he wants to illustrate. The conclusion is obvious: when man worships mammon, he loses his humanity. The extreme case is Patrick Bateman, the American Psycho, and although we may not all become serial killers, the American obsession with brands is a dehumanizing pathology. This is the reason Ellis describes in detail the attire of each character on every occasion in the book (he does this perhaps a hundred times, rattling off the designer or brand name of four or five articles of clothing), as well as going into detail about restaurant names and many, many other objects. The repetition of these pricey brand names is important so as to hammer home his point over, and over, and over. He wants our attention. It is crucial to understanding the book. Where else in the narrative is there this kind of repetition? It is in the brutal murders with the gory details. Draw your own conclusions.

i read this book in one day with a stupid grin on my face the whole time. giggling in subways with wrinkled old women staring at me. yes, there are horrible torture scenes, graphic sex scenes, etc. & this book is 'not for everyone'--if you have no sense of humor, you may end up throwing it in the trash as did an acquaintance of mine.
but
the insights into the workings of Patrick Bateman's [the token American Psycho] mind are incisive, witty, & REAL--he is not some laughable caricature meant to scare the reader or disgust, he is a real person, a clearly developed character, who deals with his oh-so-unfulfilled life in a "slightly" deviant manner. The book is in part a satire on decadent New York society, VACUOUS stamped across everyone's face, people who hear only what they want to hear [& this is made hilariously clear in the novel...do read & find out how]. A look at how people who simply have too much money deal with that 'anxiety.' The graphic torture & sex scenes are more of that, the sheer waste & opulence, it is nothing over which to become morally outraged.

More of what makes this book so great is how Ellis channels the reader into Bateman's mind, completely--do not be surprised if you find a few uncharacteristic thoughts popping into your head days / weeks later. i am not gifted with a very good memory but i can recall this book in great detail. i call it empowering in a way, not in that it inspires the reader to begin a killing spree, but it lowers the threshold of 'reserve,' the obscenely inflated decorum that seems to grow on one when one is not looking.

This is without a doubt one of my top three favorite books, with Coin Locker Babies by Murakami & V. by Pynchon. It's a heaping slab of euphoria.

[i am now, of course, frantically going after the rest of his books--although from what i have heard this seems to be his best]