My Dark Places - James Ellroy

There is the auto-biography and then there is My Dark Places - James Ellroy's look back into the death of his mother and its impact on his life. Book publishers can advertise this the book in the vein of Ellroy's crime fiction because part of the book is an actual investigation into who killed his mother, but the majority is a grim tale of a childhood cursed by sad events and bad influences and how they impacted a soon to be teenager and young adult. Ellroy doesn't philosophize about the emotional ramifications of his mother's death and the insecurities it created within him, but acts as a beat writer reporting the facts and moving on. For an article, that would be a simple objective but Ellroy spends an entire book listing his faults and bad actions. The detail goes into subject matter so embarassing and tramautizing that one has to feel Ellroy is trying exonerate himself from the hate he held for his mother after her death. The investigation part of the book is interesting, but relates back to most true crime. The scary details of the biographical subject matter is the true fascination.