American Psycho

American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis, 399 pages

Patrick Bateman is certainly a wealthy Wall Street executive.  He is probably an undiagnosed schizophrenic.  He may be a serial killer.

Reading American Psycho is an unpleasant experience.  Of course, there are the detailed descriptions of grisly, sadistic violence, much of it of a sexual nature, but equally dreadful are the extensive descriptions, at some point during each of Bateman's encounters, of the designer fashions everyone is wearing, often accompanied by similarly elaborate descriptions of brand name electronics and popular music.  American Psycho is often described as a satire on the '80s, or Wall Street, or both, but is not nearly so narrow.  Bateman and his circle could be displaced with only minor adaptations to contemporary LA or DC - indeed, the presence of Donald Trump as Bateman's idol offers a tempting invitation to any exceptionally dull filmmakers with access to the movie rights.  It is even easy to imagine a alternate version of the novel following a Dennis Rader-like figure living quietly in the suburbs.  Bateman's curse is not wealth or Reaganism, but boredom.  He attempts to escape from his superficial world through increasingly frenzied acts of transgression, but they only compound his problem.

Unfortunately. the same superficiality characterizes the novel itself.  It is based around a gimmick - vapid investment banker is a crazed killer, only he's so boring that no one notices - and although Ellis pushes it as far as he can, it only goes so far.