It had been more than ten years since I last read anything by Ellroy. It was probably a good move, as after three of his books in relatively quick succession I had reached a point of saturation. Last week though I was very much ready to get on with another one of his books and I'm glad I did.
According to Wikipedia, for conspiracy theorists looking at the assassination of JFK "Common culprits include the FBI, the CIA, the U.S. military, the Mafia, the military-industrial complex, Vice President Johnson, Castro, the KGB, or some combination thereof". Predictably, Ellroy opts for blaming all of them.
What comes out of this is a pretty gripping novel that just about anyone would be able to identify as an Ellroy one even without looking at the book's cover. The dialogue is (too?) sharp and (too?) irreverent, the plot intricate but somehow intelligible, and the real-life characters add enough verosimilitude that one is left wondering about the plausibility of some of these potential conspiracies.
And the fact that, as often happens, there's enough Hollywood Golden Era glam in these pages is a marvellous thing for me and Rock Hudson's fake hookup with a female dancer to cover his homosexuality is an excellent plot device!
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