What the what? Ellis is an iconic writer, and very much has his own approach to story telling but I found this a challenge. I’ve read some of his other work, Rules of Attraction and American Psycho, and enjoyed them. He does have a tendency to focus on the minutia of life and it can leave you wondering why you’re reading this when you could be doing nothing with your own life. But, this book just annoyed me. Ellis doesn’t write loveable characters, and that possibly had a lot to do with my feelings on this book. It’s a collection of vignettes with characters and event crossing over, much like his work generally, but there was no story arc. And again, maybe that’s what i didn’t like. I wanted a beginning middle and end. This was just a load of self-centred twats doing nothing, going nowhere and bringing nothing to each other’s lives or mine. Is that what I’m supposed to take from this?
Questions, I got a lot of questions from reading The Informers. I felt like I was missing something the whole time and maybe I was, but I want to understand what I’m reading.
This was like going to a party with a bunch of people you don’t like but having to stay late out of politeness. The night is spent having innane conversations that suck the life out of you and leave you tired and world weary. Again, is that what he was going for because it seems to reflect some of the characters.
And, while the story does a 360 from chapter 1 to chapter 13, I had pretty much forgetten all about the charcters in chapter 1 that having them pop up again 12 chapters later didn’t give me any satisfaction. I spent a lot of time going back to see who was who and how they all fit together until I gave up and just kept going. My interest waning.
Perhaps the way to read this as short stories. Not all at once. And don’t bother with who is who in each of the stories. It won’t matter.
On an individual level, each chapter might have been interesting, but as a whole, I can’t recommend this. I usually keep my books but before I had even finished i was wondering what charity to give this to.
If I’ve missed something profound, please tell me.
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