Less Than Zero

Rating:
Summary: Devastating Read
Review: LESS THAN ZERO is a damning chronicle of a bankrupt and heartless existence in a specific time (early/mid eighties) and place ( upper crust Los Angeles), and it depicts this world with such telling realism that one cannot help but believe it. I've spent the last 2 plus years getting to know the city of Los Angeles and it's strange inhabitants, and this book rings true to many of the people I've met and the experiences I've shared with them. It is a book I don't believe I'll soon forget, and I highly recommend it to anyone who suspects that there may be more to life than dollar signs and coke lines. It is a book that seeks to tell the truth about a world that doesn't want to hear it. And for that, it get's my highest recommendation.

Also recommended: THE LOSERS' CLUB by Richard Perez

Rating:
Summary: Memorable -- and worth owning!
Review: I picked this book up because it is about LA. My sister and I have a running argument about which is a more corrupt place to live, LA or New York.

I now have plenty of ammunition to win the argument. Such a sad book. The characters live lonely, hollow, emotionless lives. Rushing from one physical sensation to the next. The dynamics between the friends (and I use the term friend's very loosely) is compelling. Clay, the main character is returning to LA after a semester at a University in New Hampshire.

Blair, Clay's on again, off again, girl friend figures prominently in the story. She seems to have at least the ability to feel something. Unfortunately, her feelings seem to gravitate toward Clay, who when he is not trying to ingest every mind altering substance known to man, is sleeping with whoever he can, gender not being an issue for him.

Sadly, although this is a fictional novel, it rings true to me. Graphic, and funny at times, it is a depressing look at being young, beautiful and rich in LA.

There is a climax to Clay's story, and it has convinced me that the character is so jaded as to be a sociopath.

The author flips back and forth between Clay's childhood, which is not unhappy by any means, and his current life which to him at least doesn't seem unhappy. But to me seems aimless, and hopeless.

I liked the book enough to have read it in one sitting, although I'm not sure if it is because I liked the story or I felt as though I had witnessed a murder and couldn't look away from the body.

Rating:
Summary: _Catcher in the Rye_ It Is Not!
Review: Don't be tricked as I was into reading this book because a review on the back of the book says it is the new _Catcher in the Rye_. What an insult to Mr. Salinger. This is a dull and boring book. I felt that certain things were put into the book just simply to shock people. Also, the incessant drug use gets very old after the first 50 pages. Clay, the main character, is almost a nonfactor in the book. Other than the last chapter, I don't remember him voicing his opinion to anyone, not even the audience. The only thing that I got out of this book was a taste of the outrageously debauched lifestyle of young people living in Los Angeles in the 80's. If that interests you, then read this book.

Rating:
Summary: Maybe it doesn't withstand the test of time
Review: I wasn't as blown away by this book as I expected to be. Perhaps the changing times and a different society that exists today as compared to 1986 play a part in forming my opinion. There was nothing in the book that truly captured my imagination, nor did I find the book to be a particularly shocking portrayal of American society.

The literary narrative didn't grab me, either. I found the writing to be dry and unspirited. Ellis's efforts in "American Psycho" were far superior.

Perhaps I'm judging this book harshly and unfairly. After all, it was Ellis's first novel and it was published nearly 20 years ago. Still, it didn't entertain me, nor did it cause me to think particularly. Overall, I was disappointed.

Rating:
Summary: A Less Than Zero review
Review: Although it was written about twenty years ago, Less Than Zero is still one of the best and most controversial books of all time. Bret Easton Ellis wrote this book knowing that it would make people think. It does just that. Less Than Zero is an adventurous story that provokes thought and inspires.
The main character Clay takes the reader into his private life. He describes what it's like to live in a wealthy community in California and have movie stars as friends. Ellis writes about the characters' heavy partying and cocaine usage.
Throughout the story the main character gives off a vibe that he's not happy with his life. Clay goes through the motions of partying and doing drugs but he isn't satisfied with his way of living. He feels like something is missing in his life. People can relate to this in their own lives. This is what makes Ellis such a good writer. He writes about things that other people can relate to.
The language Ellis uses lets the reader understand exactly what is going on. The reader doesn't have to stumble through unclear passages or have to reread sections to comprehend the message Ellis is trying to convey.

The book Less Than Zero has raised many issues in the literature community. The controversy of drugs and sex mixed with young people has raised questions about our society and why someone would write a novel like this. The point is to make people think. The point is to change lives. Ellis does a brilliant job of making this point. When Ellis wrote this book he never intended for it to be so controversial. He says it "was controversial, I suppose just because of how young I was
coupled with what was at the time graphic subject matter. I've never searched for controversy". Nevertheless Less Than Zero is a great book. It makes people think about their decisions and how it affects other people.

Rating:
Summary: Bad déjà vu!
Review: The only reason I bought/read this book was 'cause someone on a website said it ressembled Chuck Palahniuk's style; that person must've been on drugs... bad ones.
I knew I should've stayed away from the book as soon as I saw the "Catcher in the Rye for the MTV generation" review. It took me one page to realize I was reading an 80's remake of said book, plus drugs and some sex scenes thrown in for good measure. I hated "Catcher" and now I hate "Less than 0". The only positive thing I found about the book was the fact that someone with absolutely nothing to say and with a basic understanding of the english language can write a book and make some money from of it.
Can anybody tell me what's so interesting about this book, anyway? There's no beggining, no ending, no substance, no soul... no nothing! It's nothing but a bad, sorry, pathetic attempt to make the reader feel pity for a bunch of unsatisfied rich kids. I have no sympathy for rich kids, imaginary or real.
Avid reader, beware! Waste not your hard earned money on a silly book like this one, I learned my lesson the hard way. Do yourself a favor and read ANY book by Chuck Palahniuk, you won't regret it. Cheers.

Rating:
Summary: Nights (and days) of the Living Dead
Review: First of all, it must be said that this first novel is quite an achievement for somebody who had it published while still in college. Ellis' writing style is mature, fluid and almost too knowing. He is also writing about what he (presumably) knows: the bleak landscape and soulscape of the wealthy in 1980's Los Angeles.

Not so much a novel as a series of vignettes experienced by Clay during his semester break from his New Hampshire college, the novel follows Clay as he tries to reconnect with his old friends, and witnesses the amoral lives of those he once knew but now feels disconnected from. We follow a cast of characters of rich, self-centered fathers, weak, ineffectual mothers, and friends who have a lifestyle well beyond what the majority of those in the United States have ever experienced. In the majority of his works, Ellis writes from the vantage point of the rich and privileged, only occasionally providing glimpses of the "hoi polloi" who live well beneath the means of the main characters and the simmering class struggle that exists at the core of America.

It was very hard for me to grow a real fondness for any of the characters as they all seemed to be zombies and old beyond their years. Perhaps that is Ellis' point. Despite baking underneath the California sun, the characters have become automatons, going through the routine of life in such a haze that nothing matters. And in ture Ellis fashion, other people are seen as little more than respositories for sex or drugs, used for that fleeting instant to get a quick high. This reveals itself in the end in two rather grotesque scenes that are back to back and show just how desensitized these people have become.

This book definitely shows all the promise that was fulfilled in Ellis' second novel, "The Rules of Attraction" and the promise that was lost in the overly ambitious and gratuitous-on-many-levels "American Psycho." I think it would be interesting one day to have Ellis write about those who are a few more rungs down that social ladder. I don't feel that he *has* to do so, or really even needs to, but if he is so willing to expose the lives of the rich, good Lord, what does he think of the rest of us?

Rating:
Summary: A Success
Review: This novel is a success on two levels. The first is in its depiction of a morally corrupt and empty Los Angeles landscape. A generation coming to grips with the inability of consumerism to satisfy the soul. On a second level, it is a definitive description of 1980's culture. The music, the clothes, the attitute, the excess. It's all in here.

Ellis achieved a fame rare to any American novelist because of the shock value of his young age at the time of publishing "Less Than Zero" but he has lasted and cultivated a loyal audience because of his talent and his ability to capture the time and place of America in the latter half of the twentieth century.

Rating:
Summary: The Money, Lust, and Non-Fizzy Coke Of Rich L.A. Youngsters
Review: This is the book that got me started into the Bret Easton Ellis books about sex, drugs and rock-and-roll. This book, told by a experienced 18-year-old named Clay, was an opposition of the college life that The Rules of Atttraction was. This book was about the Californian lifestyle of coming back home for Christmas vacation, kind of the story after The Rules ends.

Anyway, Clay is back from a semester at Camden College in New Hampshire and he's getting back into the games of drugs, fast cars, rock clubs, cheap sex, unlimited money, yet limited excitement. He goes through many things that kind of has him showing how is dissatisfied with his life. Clay really doesn't try to patch things up with his ex-girlfriend, the reluncant Blair but tries to talk with her more often and tries most of the book to talk to his best friend, Julian, who's turned into a junkie/dealer--and is too damaged to escape. Clay and Blair and their other friends (including Kim, Alana, Rip, Griffen, and etc.) are all busy, throughout his visit, partying at night clubs with fake IDs, snorting cocaine up the wahzoo and listening to lots of typical music of the time. Through out the novel, Clay goes to the desert to think things over, and his flashbacks about significant moments in his life.

This book is the start of the youth quake of real teenager life. Kids do smoke, do snort, do sex, do party the way it's shown in Less Than Zero. This book shows how controversial today's, or yesterday's society, still is. Kids have their own lives and parent's don't know.

Rating:
Summary: leaves you feeling empty...
Review: An honest look at the youth of the 80s. Ellis wrote this book when he was 23, not knowing that less than zero would make you feel less than zero. A depressing read that shows you what the disaffected youth of the 80s did. Coke sex and money was all that mattered. A truly unnerving part is on christmas morning when Clays father writes checks to his kids as gifts. the way its described is like its business as usual which is so sad.This book drags you into the 80s lifestyle with an amazing sense of reality.You feel like you are there. Bret Easton Ellis is a fantastic author