Who has read American Psycho ? I need you...<spoilers>

[ComeWhineWithMe]

I really want to read this book but is it really terrible? I am a bit scared to read the zoo bit.

[meltedmarsbars]

Its awful. I threw it out once I was finished it and deleted it from my mind.

Worth reading though, to know what the fuss was about.

[ComeWhineWithMe]

Oh dear it is like a scab I know I shouldn't pick but really really want to.

[MaeMobley]

I read it and hated it. It is grim. After finishing it, I felt soiled.

[GooseyLoosey]

I hated it. It is the only book I refused to keep in the house after I had read it. The consists of nothing more than descriptions of designer possessions and shockingly graphic violence. I found the descriptions of sadistic torture sickening. I truly wish I had never read it as one scene in particular has bothered my for years.

[meltedmarsbars]

Wasn't just me then!

[Gemjar]

I loved the book, but then it takes a lot to gross me out. There is no doubt that the character of Patrick Bateman is a very sick puppy indeed, but the book is still very well written. If you're still not sure, maybe watch the film first, or try reading some of Brett Easton Ellis' other books to get into his style of writing.

As I said I would recommend the book, but it does cut quite close to bone if you are easily shocked

[PaulineMole]

it is quite, quite grim.

mind you, I borrowed it from the library when I was about 13. perhaps it is easier to stomach as an adult.

I did really like the film though. The violence was less explicit allowing the story and character to be better shown off.

[Francagoestohollywood]

I read it 15 yrs ago. I loved it. It is very violent though.

[ComeWhineWithMe]

I do read a lot of horror so not easily shocked but I have read reviews which have said pretty much the same as what everyone has posted here.

Think I will order it and give it a go ..if I hate it I can give it my Uncle who will read anything .

[Jux]

It was horrible. Not just gross, which it was, but just plain horrible.

DH read it first and he was nasty and bad tempered and mean all the while. Then he passed it to me, and I realised it was affecting me too.

I don't recommend it. I'm not easily shocked, and I wasn't shocked. It was just gratuitously unpleasant. I don't really know what the point of it was - to let everyone know what seriously unpleasant, shallow twats those Wall Street guys are/were? It went to extremes and there was no one, no one in that book that had a redeemable feature.

I have read something else by the author and can't remember anything about it. I wonder if he wrote this one simply to indulge in his own unpleasant fantasies, in which case I would say forget it. Don't indulge him.

[pipkin35]

Read it, and found it very interesting. It is extremely graphic. Sometimes it seems pointless, but it's supposed to be reflective of the consumerist society it's critising - as well as the violence going on for pages and being brutal, so are the descriptions of what they're wearing/listening too etc...
What's alarming is that you quickly get desensitised to the violence. (I studied it against One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest as an assignment on insanity).
Probably wouldn't dare to pick it up now though. Seem to have got very sensitive these days.
Got a real vague sense that BEE is a misogynist...but then I really liked the bleakness of Less than Zero (when I was a 'meaningful' 20 something')...and in fact, less than Zero or Rules of Attraction examine similar themes without being so hideous - though there are horrid sexual/violent images int here too.

[ragged]

An awful lot of it is not about physical violence but other forms of people being truly awful to each other and literally creating the Psycho that is Bateman He is deluded and insecure to a level you can't imagine until you read it.

I would like to read it again, sometime, but must say that I found the violence so graphic that I ended up deciding that at least half of it was entirely fantasy in his head (so I just skimmed over it and didn't see that I needed to know the details, anyway).

[suburbophobe]

I read it, shockingly violent! Brilliant book tho! Flogged it to the second-hand bookshop after finishing it, and luckily I've forgotten most of it!! :o

[MrsZuko]

I read it mainly because someone had warned me off it and I wanted to see what the fuss was about. I hated it - I found it utterly gruelling and it's the only book I wish I'd never read. The majority of the violence is directed against women which makes it much more personal somehow. Most of the men I know who've read it didn't seem to be as bothered.

[madamimadam]

ComeWhineWithMe, Nooooo! Don't buy it! Borrow if you can but don't pay cold hard cash for it. Can you not get it from the library?

I completely agree with what everyone's said about it being gratuitously unpleasant. I could have stomached it better if it had any depth to it but I thought it was morally vacuous and as shallow as the people he was presumable satirising. It also upset me as it was so obviously determined to disgust in the most misogynistic ways possible, I thought.

I actually tore up my copy as I didn't want anyone else to read it (and books are sacrosanct at Madamplatz). Otherwise, I'd send you my copy!

PS My DH lent it to his grandmother, after skimming through the first chapter. He thought 'it was such a nice description of New York'...

[pissedrightoff]

Hideous.Hideous.Hideous.I read it after DH had, The most worrying thing was that after I had read it DH said to me ''It was a shame what he did to that homeless man's dog eh?'' very worrying

[mattellie]

It?s a modern classic and Bret Easton Ellis is a superb writer. That said, it?s better if you read his books in the order in which they were written ? American Psycho should really be read after Less Than Zero and Rules Of Attraction, and then they can be seen as a kind of trilogy charting the degrading effects of drugs, sex and violence respectively on the human soul.

God, sorry that sounds a bit pretentious But seriously, reading them in the correct order does give you a slightly different perspective on the extreme violence of American Psycho.

[Jux]

I'm glad there was a point to them, mattellie! I thought it was just horrid for the sake of it

(like some of the 'new' crime writers!)

[PlentyOfPockets]

I thought it was a brilliantly written portrayal of obsession and of a completely soulless society. I didn't enjoy reading it, but I found it hard to put down and would read it again. It does stay with you though - don't read it if you're feeling a bit sensitive. My DP was extremely bothered by the misogynistic violence but he thought it was a great book too.

[BlackFLAMECandle]

another person here with it being the only book I've willingly gotten rid of.

Just horrible for horrible's sake.

[scottishmummy]

vile gratuitous violence.long huey lewis and phol collins drone.the paul allan thing was overdone

read it,wished i had not

[EvilAllenPoe]

i wish i could un-read it. it contains graphic accounts of obscene torture & murder.

don't need those images in my mind. I have enough problems with knoing about real historical atrocities without knowing about imagined ones.

the book is oddly ..boring too. the psycho finds it all extremely dull.

[GibbonWithAnAppleBobbingBibOn]

I started reading it many years ago but had to stop as I found it too disturbing.

Still find it hard to fathom how anyone could even imagine those scenes.

[EvilAllenPoe]

i felt similar about ... some James Herbert and 'Filth' by Irvine Welsh.

[Acanthus]

I hated it (but I finished it )

It's the only book I have ever put in the bin