hello people! sorry its been a while I've been busy with mocks and college. Today I thought I would do a one off thing, I doubt I will do this again because only a few books ever amaze me and I do read quite a lot when I can. I just finished reading American Psycho written by Bret Eaton Ellis, the story takes us into the perspective of a rich playboy called Patrick Bateman who works in Wall Street the only problem is, he is a psychopath who enjoys killing anything with a pulse. We get an insight on his life and the brutality and pleasure he gets from murdering.
Its an interesting book, the way its written is peculiar I've never read anything like it so I'm going to try and explain why its unique in a series of points
1) we never get a good idea of what people look like and thats very strange usually we get a description but because Patrick is fixated on clothes we always find out what people wear including himself and the women he kills, which is why I preferred the book over the film because its mysterious the film however kinda destroys it because we see the characters, the book allows us to imagine.
2) its off topic, Patrick gets very easily distracted and it only lasts for a sentence- the Patty Winters show turns up in almost every chapter.
3) its jumpy, we never really get a fluent story because it jumps from place to place without dates and we don't find out when he does things.
4) lots of swearing and sex... disturbing sex so if your not comfortable with stuff like that, do not read!
5) perspective changes, there is a chapter which changes from 1st person to 3rd person and I have no idea why but its a very good chapter!
6) there are 3 chapters dedicated to Phil Collins, Huey Lewis and Whitney Houston. Patrick literally talks about their songs whereas in the film they merge it with killing scenes a great example is when he talks about Whitney and he is with 2 girls, this doesn't happen in the book but I do prefer the film version.
7) it takes almost 100 pages for him to kill someone although there are references to previous kills that just weren't mention like the blood on his sheets in the Chinese laundrette, you don't know who's it is because its not mentioned.
I think thats everything I could pick out about the strange-nous of the book but what is brilliant is that his character slowly deteriorates throughout the book, the killings become worse and more frequent and he becomes more and more insane. I would say that this book is very disturbing because the author captures and explores details brilliantly, the description is amazing but its sickly and it gets worse and worse as Patrick's lust for blood intensifies, I wont say too much but the film missed out a lot of the brutality like a specific chapter which I skipped, Patrick kills a dog but the detail of it was too much for me I had to move ahead, whilst the description is good the image it gives you isn't nice but he needed to express the monstrous behaviour of this killer and the fact he will kill anyone- spoiler alert he kills a child.
The life he lives during the beginning is luxurious, he works out, he's healthy, he's good with his money and he has a good job with nice friends that he can socialise with but as the story unravels you find out he's a drug addict and a murder who is constantly returning video tapes and like I said his behaviour changes every so often.
The character is funny he's sarcastic and patronising but most of all he is scary, he is more or less a normal guy but he's a monster and no one knew despite his efforts to tell people and thats what is interesting and quite horrifying, he tells people but they refuse to listen or on separate occasions he thinks of telling them. It's a complex book that is sometimes difficult to read but its hard to put down as well, I got addicted to it because I've never read anything like it but there were parts where I thought I wanna stop this is gross. What he does to his victims is horrible but its details are explored amazingly that it makes it sickening I will use a few words that describe a few scenes that will either put you off the book or make you want to read it
Rat... orifice and cheese
cooking... brains and nipples (explain that one!)
chainsaw
So yes the scenes are very graphic and I wouldn't recommend it to people with weak stomachs however it is a great read, its interesting, intriguing and written brilliantly, its possibly one of the best books I have read due to its unique structure and 1st person view, the book wouldn't be the same without that aspect and its like sometimes he gets lazy, in a few scenes the description and his routine are fascinating but then the following chapter will be a paragraph long literally listing things; its a bizarre book!
Another thing that caught my attention is the child like behaviour of his friends, they high-five and make silly jokes again expressing the almost ordinary world he lives in but in reality he hates it and he hates the fact he hasn't been caught but he's scared of it as well.
I give this a 9/10 its better than the film although Bale's performances captures the madness of Patrick brilliantly however the book goes into a lot more detail offering a gruesome yet entertaining story of the life of a psychopath. I have a few favourite quotes that I would like to share, some are funny and some are deep:
"when I look over at Luis in one brief flashing moment his head looks like a talking vagina and it scares the bejesus out of me"
"there's a moment of sheer terror when I discover Paul's apartment overlooks the park"
"the things I could do to you with a coat hanger"
"I have to return some video tapes"
"I'm into, oh murders and executions mostly. It depends"
"... there is an idea of Patrick Bateman, some kind of abstraction, but there is no real me, only an entity, something illusory, and though I can hide my cold gaze and you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours and maybe you can even sense our lifestyles are comparable; I simply am not there"
A scene to look out for is the business card scene, its brilliant!
anyway thanks for reading, I picked this book up for £1.99 so if you like that sorta stuff definitely pick it up. I was convinced by someone at HMV to read it and I'm glad I did!
Hope you enjoyed
Until next time!
I have quite a few drafts saved so I'm working my way through them, 1 will be about Marvel battles- that should be interesting.
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