Reviews

American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis

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meowllyn's review against another edition

2.0

this is the best example of using shock factor to your disadvantage. the gore was overwhelming at times, without doing anything of value for the story. Ellis quilted the symptoms of different disorders to build his apathetic homicidal protagonist.
the only redeeming quality is that since the narrator is an unreliable one, the ending is up to you, the reader, so Ellis can't ruin that for you as well.

pantslint's review against another edition

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dark funny tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

Having read Clark's Boy Parts first, I can appreciate this book for what it is based on when it was published (early 90s). Though, I'm definitely judging it based on today's standards around social climate, which is the main reason why my rating is fairly low.

The extreme violence against women in American Psycho is quite honestly unnecessary. Yes—Bateman is literally a murderer and actually the worst person ever, but it turned into senseless torture porn. There is an extreme amount of sexual violence disproportionate to the need for my understanding of his character. I can already infer that he's a raging, violent misogynist—without the detailed grisly scenes

of how he tortures sex workers and his other dates.

Even more, I think Ellis uses enough methods to display the unraveling psychological state of Bateman's character, without having to write such extreme scenes of torture.
For example:

senseless and increasingly violent murders of the poor
completely unreliable narration
stream of consciousness writing
chapters that are just random reviews of music albums
increasingly racist and homophobic descriptions of others, including frequent slurs
his ample knowledge of other serial killers and their lives
In Ch. 46, when narration switches to 3rd-person as he dissociates

There's so much more. But my main point is that Ellis already did all that and I'm making the argument that Ellis only ended up writing torture porn for the incels. Whatever!!!

This book made me fucking LAUGH. There are so many one-liners and ridiculous conversations to choose from:

Price says, "...for Christ sakes—you can get dyslexia from pussy—" when talking out of his ass about the AIDS epidemic (Ch. 1)
"You spin a dreidel, Preston... not a menorah. You spin a dreidel." (Ch. 3)
Bateman's tirade about the red snapper pizza (Ch. 4), because what a fucking freak
Van Patten replying, "They didn't look Spanish to me." when Price sarcastically remarks that the table of women would be hot if you speak Farsi (Ch. 5)
The f-bomb war in the bathroom (Ch. 5)
A CLUB LITERALLY CALLED "NEKENIEH" (Ch. 10)
"...the thing looks like a fucking Big Mac" (Ch. 14)
the phrase, "low, faggoty whisper" in Ch. 21 because what in the actual fuck does that mean
MAKING FUN OF THE OLD QUEER MAN'S LISP IN HIS NARRATION... "Akthent on thee latht thyllable" and "exathperated" was FOULLLLL (Ch. 22) The dithrethpect is crazy 😭
All of Chapter 41, "Another Night." Because what in the Mean Girls???
The chocolate dipped urinal cake in Ch 43....

Ellis is a great satire writer. Don't even get me started on how everyone calls each other the wrong name and how they all just go with it.

All in all, I enjoyed the book. I'm sorry, I skipped the album review chapters. And the branded descriptions of what everyone wears. If I didn't, I don't think I would have finished this book at all.

Content Warnings

lizb17's review against another edition

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dark

3.75

puglord's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

avery_hutchinson's review against another edition

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dark slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

Interesting writing style, but it felt like the book was attempting to be as vulgar and dark as possible without having much of a clear message that I could discern.

Content Warnings