I’m sorry but I could not read this book due to the writing style. I was not able to keep my attention on the successive run on sentences.

This book was amazing! I have always been a fan of Ellis and this book was no disappointment. It is a very nostalgic trip back to the 1980s, as well as a psychological suspense story. A long book, but well worth the read.

I don't question Bret Easton Ellis' writing; I would never do that. But I'm questioning the "fictionness" of the story. Trawler might be a replacement for some other serial killer terrorizing streets of LA, but everyone else, really all fiction? Because I feel like you need have a bit of American Psycho in you (probably in your teenage years) to write American Psycho.

The story was way too real to get out of it after you turned the final page. Rawness of emotions and lack thereof, "impeccable" private school environment and all the perks attached to it, and every single character in it: they are all unique but also combination of what you could expect from everyone in that kind of environment.

It wasn't a page turner (sometimes makes you contemplate turning that page or not) and it was hard to digest. It was hard to figure out who to believe, who to trust. Was Bret the true narrator or his alter ego? Was Robert really the troubled one or was it everyone else? I'm still thinking about this book, and it will be a while before I can get over it

I've been waiting for a new Bret Easton Ellis book for years. I'm sure many people feel this way. I knew going into this book that I was going to love it and I absolutely did. I missed this world that he creates so much! In this book, it's almost like an autobiography but then fictionalized while using real events, but still fiction? I don't know- but it's super well done and interesting. The protagonist and narrator is young Bret Ellis, the same guy who wrote American Psycho. The fictional Ellis looks back at the year 1981 and the events that made him who he is: We learn about a psychopathic killer called the Trawler and an over-the-top cult who haunt Los Angeles, and they come for 17-year-old Bret and his friends who are seniors at the elite Buckley School. Real life Ellis also graduated from Buckley. The Trawler was a serial killer in LA in 1981 (I got to Googling while reading) but he targeted elderly women. Bret took that story and spun it to fit the narrative of this book and it was super successful. I was creeped out and chilled to the bone on several occasions. Having said that please be warned that this book is not for the faint of heart. The descriptions of the murders for some will be beyond disturbing and nightmare inducing. As a reader you will also have to endure all sorts of debauchery. If teens getting high and having sex is a no no for you then move right along. As I approached the end I thought I’d worked it all out, but a surprising and somewhat ambiguous ending cast some doubt on that. It’s definitely one of the most mysterious, addictive and truly impactful books I’ve come across in a very long time.

“Many years ago I realized that a book, a novel, is a dream that asks itself to be written in the same way we fall in love with someone: the dream becomes impossible to resist, there's nothing you can do about it, you finally give in and succumb even if your instincts tell you to run the other way.”
More interesting than Less Than Zero but like, way too long lol. Don't read if you don't care about rich teenagers having rich teenager problems. I liked it a lot but I wish an editor had gone a little harder on cutting things out lol

A psychological thriller set in the nineteen eighties, you have my attention and it comes from an author of American Psycho. I know this is going to be mystifying ride. A serial killer is on the loose, anyone could be next and paranoia is running rampant. The storytelling is exceptional and the suspense factor is high, this story has everything a fan of psychological thrillers can expect. It’s has a mystery, suspense, a dash of horror, paranoia, and a character who very secretive. A nostalgic flashback for Gen X.

Disclaimer: Thank you NetGalley and Knopf for this review copy and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

I read my first Bret Easton Ellis book back in high school, American Psycho, and found myself absolutely swept away in the gradual madness of Patrick Bateman. Almost 30 years later, The Shards is released, and I had a repeat of the same chills experienced before!

The Shards is a fictionalized, first person, retelling of the time when high schooler Bret Easton Ellis is coming of age, figuring out his sexuality, writing his first novel, Less Than Zero and living through the uncertainty of a serial killer targeting teenagers in his city.

With all the 1980s flair and literary styling of Less Than Zero, along with the attention to detail, Ellis is known for as seen in American Psycho, this book was a treat to read.

This was a thick book, coming in at 600 pages in the build up that this length provides really creates an immersive effect in the story and timeline. By the time this book was done, I was completely in it, to the point where I had to check online afterwards, if it was actually fiction! I’ve never had to do that before!

The immersive writing style sucked me in, and I felt like I was part of the story going along with his friend group and experiencing they are events along with them so much to the effect by the that at the end, I was physically feeling the stress along with the characters.

Its slow, build mystery thriller was excellent. As I said, I was already a reader of Bret Easton Ellis’s work, and I extremely enjoyed the return to his style. He has a really fascinating way of fictionalize in his own life and story as seen in this book, and in Lunar Park.

Fans of slow build, high reward, thrillers and/or of the 1980s LA scene will extremely enjoy this book.

Thanks to the publisher Knopf Publishing group and NetGalley for my review copy. Opinions are my own.

The Shards is available now.

Many have described this novel as a sort of feverish nightmare, and I have to agree. This book is gruesome in more ways than one and definitely not for the faint of heart. That said, if you can handle some sex and gore, this is an excellent thriller. While quite long at just over 600 pages, BEE somehow keeps the pacing up and keeps readers enthralled. Highly recommended.

Thanks to NetGalley and Knopf Publishing Group for gifting me a digital ARC of the new book by Bret Easton Ellis - 3 stars!

It's Los Angeles in the 1980s and a serial killer, named The Trawler, is on the loose. Bret is a senior at the exclusive Buckley prep school, when a new student, Robert, arrives. Robert has a secret and Bret is soon obsessed with him as he becomes part of his close-knit group of friends. Bret is also obsessed with The Trawler, and sees connections with things happening around him, even though others don't.

This is a long book - over 600 pages - and while I liked the writing style and the coming-of-age theme, there was too much of everything for me, especially the lurid sexual descriptions and thoughts. To me, there was too much repetition and description of the time period - every scene is marked with the name brands of clothing, music and movies, cars, hair, etc, as well as description of LA streets and locations. This one is getting rave reviews so call me the outlier here!

“𝑬𝒗𝒆𝒓𝒚 𝒉𝒐𝒓𝒓𝒐𝒓 𝒔𝒕𝒐𝒓𝒚 𝒘𝒆 𝒉𝒆𝒂𝒓𝒅 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒇𝒂𝒍𝒍, 𝒂𝒏𝒚𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒅𝒂𝒓𝒌𝒆𝒏𝒆𝒅 𝒐𝒖𝒓 𝒃𝒖𝒃𝒃𝒍𝒆 𝒊𝒏 𝒘𝒂𝒚𝒔 𝒘𝒆 𝒏𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓 𝒏𝒐𝒕𝒊𝒄𝒆𝒅 𝒃𝒆𝒇𝒐𝒓𝒆, 𝒍𝒆𝒅 𝒕𝒐 𝒉𝒊𝒎.”

After hearing raving recommendations from Dennis (@ScaredStraightReads), Brett (@Bretts.Book.Stack) and Gare (@GareIndeedReads), I knew I had to dive into my first book by Bret Easton Ellis.

This book has the basis of so many things I enjoy reading: tension, suspense, eighties setting, rich teens, LGBTQ+ characters, and murders (wow, I sound bleak there!). The metafiction narration has a Talented Mr. Ripley vibe that has you questioning so much as you read. There’s a feeling of distrust, paranoia and apprehension that permeates the whole narrative, especially as Ellis gives little peek at what is coming (almost like flash forwards). Bret also is definitely an unreliable narrator; you really don’t know whether or not this is his writer imagination, his paranoia, the truth, or somewhere in between, which adds to many layers. I also loved the many mentions of albums, and how music is linked to so many of our memories. It is also partly a coming-of-age story, with plenty of sex, drugs, parties, and a discovery of self. It’s un-apologically graphic in places, but that made it even more absorbing. The writing is a little clunky in spots (I think this is Ellis’ style) with lots of repetition of phrases and longer run on sentences that feel like it could be trimmed down, but I was entranced by the melodrama and psychological suspense (hello Palm Springs flashlight scene: it had me FREAKED OUT!)

The Shards is a story of memories, seduction, senior year, friendships, paranoia, and obsession. It may not be for everyone, but it will stick with me for a while. Thank you to Alfred A. Knopf, Penguin Random House and NetGalley for the ARC!

Thanks to Knopf for the ARC of the latest from Bret Easton Ellis.

The term "fever dream" is one of the most overused descriptors in all of critical writing. The appeal is obvious: it's a bloody lovely term. Rolls right of the tongue. And hey, try describing the work of Dario Argento without employing it. However, it tends to be dropped all too often when a piece of art offers even the vaguest hint of something surreal.

"That episode of SpongeBob was a *total* fever dream!"
Yeah, righto, mate, settle down.

That caveat in place, I'm going to describe The Shards (Ellis' first fiction in YONKS) as a total fever dream in the truest sense of the word.

Sort of a meld of serial killer drama and quasi-autobiography (a trick he also used in 2005's Lunar Park), it's a plot-light, mood heavy trip through the lives of the uber-privileged but emotionally stunted.

Ellis gives a wonderfully vivid sense of place (LA) and time (the early 80s) and then he keeps giving it... and keeps giving it... over and over. Don't get me wrong, it's compulsive, engaging stuff but if I had to sit through one more detailed description of which side streets were taken on the drive to the next plot point, I was going audibly groan and scare my cat.

That said, it's a hard book to put down. The repetition becomes hypnotic and the narrator is less unreliable and more super high and horny all the time. Which, honestly, feels a lot like being 17 again.

Those who never understood the appeal of Ellis' work probably won't be converted by The Shards, but those of us who missed his singular (albeit often caustic) voice will find much to like (and a few things to be mildly scornful of) in this evocative [ahem] fever dream.

Is this my sentimental favorite book of all time? 👀

Hear me out. I had so much FUN reading The Shards. As much as it feels like Ellis was … dead while writing Less Than Zero, his latest novelization of this time in his life feels like it was written with introspection and dare I say… joy? Reading The Shards reminded me of the giddy experience I had reading Fear Street books as a teen, yet operating in a smart, self-aware style that I’m always looking for in fiction. I’ve been describing it as 1980s + Euphoria + Scream meets… queer longing. Which is quite simply everything I could want from a novel, aesthetically speaking.

While the novel has the plotting of a thriller, The Shards subtly presents a necessary response to the aesthetic numbness that underpinned Less Than Zero. In terms of form, Ellis is doing an Annie Ernaux-ish thing here; he embraces an autofictional mode, using the novel to frame a narrative in which a fictional Bret is reckoning with his burgeoning adulthood, attempting to bridge the gaps in his fallible memory and expounding it through fiction. The character of Bret is writing Less Than Zero while the plot of The Shards plays out, revealing how 56-year old Bret is able to understand his loss of innocence from a mature vantage point. The motif of Ellis exploring his “true” self vs. him as “writer” is the crux of this book’s brilliance. A serial killer stalks LA and haunts Bret and his friends at a private boarding school. A new student joins their ranks, and Bret believes he is the killer (and is sexually attracted to him, lol). While the slasher in itself is my favorite subgenre of horror, Bret’s imposition of himself in the narrative, and thinking about how writers and murderers alike use narrative to create character out of real people, makes this a meta thrill ride that’s impossible to put down. Aside from the book’s intelligence, it was simply an immersive experience - the use of foreshadowing, 80s set pieces (LA, movies, parties, driving, sex), and the increasingly brutal revelations, made this a treat for me and I’m truly sad that it’s over despite its length. The book hangover is real with this one.

This was my first BEE novel and I picked it up more out of curiosity than anything. And I genuinely couldn't put it down. This book is LONG but I returned to it every night and even snatched hours here and there during the day to keep reading. I'm sure all the people who said this is not as good as American Psycho or Less than Zero are right -- but it's unbelievably entertaining and compelling.

Warning: The graphic violence didn't take up much of the book, but it's worse than just about anything I can remember reading.

Thanks so much to the publishers and to netgalley for my early read in exchange for my honest review.

The Shards is a fictionalized memoir of Ellis' final year of high school in 1981 and the events that may or may not have actually occurred. Seventeen year old Bret is a senior at Buckley Prep when a new student, Robert Mallory, arrives with a mysterious past. With a serial killer named The Trawler on the loose, Bret and his friends are being taunted and face horrible acts of violence around them.

Wow. I got sucked into this one pretty fast and found myself quickly digging for answers as to if any of the plot was real. This was my very first time reading a Bret Easton Ellis novel and boy, it did not disappoint! I could not rip through the pages of this one fast enough and had to know who the Trawler was.

I continuously found myself wrapped up in the idea that I was reading a full on biography of Ellis' life or at least a real time in his life. In a way I believe this is what he wanted us as readers to sit and ponder. At the same time I also believe writing this story was a form of therapy. As someone who is currently writing a story that is based on a personal experience in my own life, I highly resonated with this. I couldn't pull myself away from it or put this book down.

What a unique take on psychological suspense. Highly recommend this one.

5 stars

This book is hard to summarize.
While reading this, I frequently used Google to research what was true and what was not (which kind of turned me off).

In LA in 1981, a serial murderer named The Trawler attacked elderly women.
Bret rewrote the tale to match the plot of this novel, and the result was fantastic. Many times I felt frightened and bone-chillingly cold.

Having said that, a word of caution: this work is not for the weak-willed. You will experience many forms of depravity as a reader but, it establishes the mood and ambiance of both the setting and the story.

I feel conflicted about this book.
In general, I didn't hate it (though at times I thought I did). While thinking it would become a DNF at roughly 300–400 pages, I continued despite being extremely bored at times. With that being said, it's mostly way too lengthy and the plot's power does not warrant the book's length which was my main gripe.

If you like Ellis, read it.

An absolute masterpiece of completely absorbing storytelling. Its the little details in The Shards - the song titles, the clothing descriptions, the movies - that build into a believable 1980s world so immersive it's almost claustrophobic. There's a cast of unique characters and a wonderfully imperfect, unreliable narrator. Just spectacular.

If this novel doesn't get adapted into a television series I would be surprised. Although, I really enjoyed the narrator's Telling of this story, so hopefully that wouldn't be lost on screen. A creative premise- right from the start you are told by the narrator himself that he is unreliable as a chronicler of events. Is it his penchant for screenwriting or the many, many quaaludes? Fact and fiction blend in this atmospheric thriller by Bret Easton Ellis. The Shards is the story that "Bret" has always wanted to write. He can picture it- dramatic tension (deftly sustained over 600 pages), teenage naivety, personal revelations, a Gen X upbringing in the Hollywood hills, and a deeply disturbed serial killer. Can Bret make sense of the trauma he and his friends experienced in 1981?

I had a really hard time with this book. It was a very slow burn and rather confusing with all the characters. I really wanted to love this book because 1980s and serial killer, I mean could it get any better. Unfortunately, it just wasn't for me and I didn't enjoy picking it up so I ended up DNFing this book. Maybe I will come back to it in the future but right now it just isn't for me.

Worth the wait for BEE's newest book. Read quickly, good pacing and loved all the songs referenced, they really set the time and place and tastes of the characters.

This book pulled me in from the very first page. This was my first book I’ve read by Bret Easton Ellis, but I now feel compelled to go back through everything I’ve missed all this time. It was a fictional autobiography is the closest way to describe this book. It was a very long coming of age novel, that had a lot of gay sex in it. I need to get my book club to read this so I have more people to talk about it with, because i can’t seem to get it out of my head!