Rock and rollers can get you the youth buzz, and younger people are fanatical readers. — James Ellroy Copy Share Image
How did I change my life? I wanted things. I wanted women and I wanted to write books. — James Ellroy Copy Share Image
For a much lauded writer, I'm not terribly self-absorbed. In social situations, which are difficult for me - I mean, this is… — James Ellroy Copy Share Image
I'm trying to be less bombastic. I love my books. I think I've done things nobody else has done. — James Ellroy Copy Share Image
I like to be alone so I can write. But focus can hurt you. I don't want to be some stress casualty… — James Ellroy Copy Share Image
“I am a master of fiction. I am also the greatest crime writer who ever lived. I am to the crime novel… — James Ellroy Copy Share Image
I am a master of fiction. I am also the greatest crime novelist who ever lived. I am to the crime novel… — James Ellroy Copy Share Image
You try to learn who you are. You work hard. You've either got it or you don't when it comes to writing… — James Ellroy Copy Share Image
The wildest ride in modern crime novel exoticum. A novel so steeped in milieu that it feels as if you've blasted to… — James Ellroy Copy Share Image
Other people, some other writers, will win certain accolades or sell in far greater numbers than me - and I'm a legitimate… — James Ellroy Copy Share Image
The 250-page outline for American Tabloid. The books are so dense. They're so complex, you cannot write like I write off the… — James Ellroy Copy Share Image
“Fear and I played peek-a-boo - it always seemed to grab my balls and twist just when it felt like something inside me could… — James Ellroy Copy Share
My father actually went to college, and my mother went to nursing school, so, you know. I wouldn't... They were actually too square and… — James Ellroy Copy Share
I've created a narrative of the world. I live in the world - tenuously, most times. I've avoided the digital world. — James Ellroy Copy Share
Some men get the world, some men get ex-hookers and a trip to Arizona. You're in with the former, but my God I don't… — James Ellroy Copy Share
In the time just before the bombing of Pearl Harbor, when Perfidia opens, we were pre-psychologized. There were no concepts of identity, no politics… — James Ellroy Copy Share
I think the great unspoken theme in noir fiction is male self-pity. It pervades noir movies. — James Ellroy Copy Share
“I didn't care who we were. I required no consummation. I knew that whoever we were and whatever we had would never stop.” — James Ellroy Copy Share
Where’s your sketch pad?” I asked. … “I gave that up,” Kay said. “I wasn’t very good, so I changed my major.” “To what?”… — James Ellroy Copy Share
I am a master of fiction. I am also the greatest crime novelist who ever lived. I am to the crime novel in specific… — James Ellroy Copy Share
I don't want to recover from writing this book [The Onion]. I feel very poised. I feel like I'm with my mother for the… — James Ellroy Copy Share
Rock and rollers can get you the youth buzz, and younger people are fanatical readers. — James Ellroy Copy Share
I don't know anybody in the underworld. I make this stuff up. I don't know any criminals. — James Ellroy Copy Share
“He took three shots a night-no more, no less. He switched from whisky to straight gin. The bum compensated for the scant volume. Three… — James Ellroy Copy Share
