Rating: ![4 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-4-0.gif) Summary: A real trip Review: Ellis had to have been there. The mood he sets in each scene is astonishing, half the time you think YOU've been there. This one is too good. Up to now I thought Tom Wolfe's "A man in full" was the play, but no, "Glamorama" is the real trip.
Rating: ![5 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-5-0.gif) Summary: BEE's Best Work Review: If you just been introduced to Bret Easton Ellis through the movie version of AP then read this book. It is the very best of the very talented writer BEE's body of work. Love the numbering of the chapters, wonderful attention to detail and fanastic plot development in the 2nd half of the book. Too bad BEE can't put out a new masterpiece every year or so, but even if he never writes again, I'll be re-reading his work, over and over again. I've allready read Glam. a couple of times.
Rating: ![4 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-4-0.gif) Summary: We'll slide down the surface of things, baby Review: Glamorama is Ellis's fifth novel and his most daring achievement thus far. The novel starts off in Manhattan, the time is 1990s, and the main character is Victor Ward. Victor is a supermodel, the IT boy for the moment, who is a womanizer, a would-be actor and musician, and overall man-about-town. He is about to open a very trendy nightclub but things don't go as Victor plans. Through a variety of circumstances Victor is plunged into a world of violence, conspiracy, and international terrorism. By the end of the novel Victor and the reader is left in a profoundly different mind set compared to the beginning of the book. One of the strengths of this book is Ellis's keen ear for dialogue. Victor's speech has a crsip flow that is well crafted by Ellis. In the novel Ellis gives us a surreal atmosphere with poetic and disturbing descriptions. I can honestly say that I will never look at a pool party the same way after reading the segment of how Victor meets his girlfriend Chloe. His characters run the gambit of either being hip or sad or funny or extremely dangerous. Eight years in the making, and it shows, Ellis had given the world a modern day masterpiece that will be read a hundred years from now.
Rating: ![3 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-3-0.gif) Summary: Hard to find the story beyond all the namedropping... Review: I am a big fan of Ellis', so when I picked up Glamorama I thought that I would be whisked away in his narrative like I usually am. However, I found it very hard to get into this book, and actually had a hard time finishing it. I found it very difficult to relate to the main character, and had a hard time following what was going on with the story. Also, celebrity names are mentioned through the entire book at an astronomical pace, which I found distracting. Seeing all of the good reviews here tells me that maybe I should try again. If you have never read any Ellis, I would recommend Less Than Zero or American Psycho before this one, because they move along at a much faster pace and are easier to follow. Somehow when I was reading this I just felt like I was missing something.
Rating: ![4 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-4-0.gif) Summary: Anything But Glamorous Review: I couldn't make it through American Psycho, but I devoured this work by Mr. Ellis. This is an amazingly energetic work, almost relentless in pacing, at least through the first two-thirds of the story. The dialogue is mesmerizing, the characters sometimes elusive but generally captivating, the storyline often hard to follow, but never boring. The protagonist, Victor Ward, is a hero so shallow that he actually generates sympathy in the reader and even becomes an unlikely underdog. I like writers who stretch the envelope. If you do too, you'll probably enjoy this work. Be warned though. The violence and the sex both reach levels that most will find pornographic.
Rating: ![5 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-5-0.gif) Summary: It's so out it's in Review: Having cut my teeth on Less Than Zero years ago, yet avoiding American Psycho, it was with some trepidation that I started Glamorama.This is a cutting look at the beautiful people. The hero is a man who is so self absorbed that he can't see that things are just not quite right in this so-called perfect world, where supermodels and actors rub shoulders with Ellis's characters. Starting in a whirlwind of New York society, Ellis manages to convey a superficiality that is obvious to all but those who are taking the obligatory designer drugs. This is a world where both men and women have been bred to be beautiful, have bought degrees at the best universtities, have got jobs through Daddy and have such fragile egos that they'll do any thing for a compliment, or a line. It's not an easy ride, and is often shocking, but it constantly surprises, leaving you with as many questions as you started. And it makes you realise that perhaps being in the in-crowd isn't as great as we imagine.
Rating: ![4 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-4-0.gif) Summary: Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis Review: Reading this book is like watching a car accident. You are horrified and disgusted and fascinated, but can't seem to look away. Let me first say this. I am avid reader and ALWAYS finish books, but the first 100 pages of this one made me want to throw this one in the trash. The "hip" lingo was annoying, the characters are/were vapid and flimsy, the tone is muddled. But I hung in there, and found that I became captivated by the turn that the plot took, and although I have been frequently confused by some of the events (who are these directors? What movie are they making? And why is it so damn cold?), I am intrigued to see that Victor, the air-head model, is finally starting to get in touch with something resembling some emotions. I am not sure that the author is going to explain all of these vague coincidences and seemingly magical way that the bad guys can "alter" everything, including real life, but it sure has been an entertaining ride.
Rating: ![5 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-5-0.gif) Summary: Glamorama. Review: GLamorama is obviously from you ratings slightly underrated. This is not a surprise. Glamorama is not an easy read. The structure is fairly out there and the text is not for the faint hearted. But I have to say I found the book absolutely riveting. Yes, it wasn't the easiest book to keep up with but for those of you who didn't get it it didi give several explanations about what was going on. The book gave everything a book should give. It gave well rounded characters, a good and interesting storyline and lots of excitement. Yes it was graphic in some places but it wasn't as if it was saying anything that shocking. IT was just saying what happens in the world of the characters and probably a lot of other people who don't dare admit it. The book did have down sides, It got a bit complicated towards the end and it did leave a few things unexplained. but that is Ellis's style. Leave it to the imagination. You can probably come up with things far more disturbing than he can. You just daren't tell anyone.
Rating: ![3 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-3-0.gif) Summary: What happened? Review: There appears to be a valid common theme among the many reviews of this book - it started out strong and then became too ambitious for its own good. I understand there was supposed to be a transformation or enlightenement of Victor's character, but I found it hard to believe that a guy who could barely intellectually survive the world of modeling/acting/celebrity was soon questioning the morals of international terrorism. Also, the dueling film crews in the second part of the book contributed nothing but confusion and annoyance, and the references to "confetti everywhere" and freezing cold temperatures were a bit overplayed. The thing that kept me going, however, was Ellis' completely original writing style. The pop culture references are abundant (if not overused) and much of the book can be summed up in the line, "When Tabitha Soren asks me what I think about the upcoming elections, I just offer the peace sign and say 'Every day my confusion grows.'"
Rating: ![5 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-5-0.gif) Summary: magnific or trash? Review: the real world , this is the real world?
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