# Bret Easton Ellis novels - Genius or Garbage?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bret-easton-ellis-novels-genius-or-garbage/110533>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [May 23, 2002, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bret-easton-ellis-novels-genius-or-garbage/110533 "2002-05-23T19:44:00Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\
**Post date:** [May 29, 2002, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bret-easton-ellis-novels-genius-or-garbage/110533/21 "2002-05-29T19:14:18Z")

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Only read _Less Than Zero_, and that was back in 1985. Shame on Ellis for ruining a perfectly good Elvis Costello song title.

Boy returns to the bosom of his filthy-rich family in L.A. after his first semester at Middlebury or wherever. People are afraid to merge on freeways. He observes a lot of tawdry goings-on (and participates in a few). Other than internally, he doesn’t question any of the bad stuff going down around him - and internally, he just wonders how bad it can get. (Pretty bad, it turns out. But since it all happens to other people, it’s no big deal.) At the end of Christmas vacation, he returns to college, apparently unchanged by it all.

I’m still clueless about why Ellis bothered to write this book (_ching!_ :D), or what I should have gotten out of the experience. Other than, “Just because QPB gives it a good review, doesn’t mean you’ll like it.”

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**Author:** ![delphica](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e9a140/32.png) [@delphica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/delphica)\
**Post date:** [May 29, 2002, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bret-easton-ellis-novels-genius-or-garbage/110533/22 "2002-05-29T20:32:02Z")

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It’s interesting that _Secret History_ was mentioned as well – I think that book works extremely well, where the BEE stuff that I’ve read (_Less Than Zero_ and _American Psycho_) doesn’t really do much for me.

I have to vote against the insane lists of products and brands. For me, it’s the most dreadful, freshman year English type of imitative fallacy. It might be somewhat effective in conveying the idea of shallow, consumer driven people, but it’s also very lazy. Clearly, a list of consumer products does in fact imply the idea of consumerism. But I always found myself asking “ok, Mr. BEE, I understand that, a fifth grader could understand that, what are you saying _about_ it?” I think Douglas Coupland uses the same concept with much greater depth and success in _Generation X_.

BEE is certainly not the worst writer out there with a publishing deal, but I think he’s a far cry from genius.

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