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Lunar Park

Easton Ellis writes about himself in a novel that pays homage to King

October 23, 2005 Edition 1

Michelle McGrane

Bret Easton Ellis (Picador)

R131

Few people who read American Psycho forget the blood-spattered pages of violence and pornography trailing in the wake of Bret Easton Ellis's bored yuppie serial killer, Patrick Bateman.

Easton Ellis acquired his reputation as enfant terrible of the literary Brat Pack with dark, satirical commentary on contemporary society, materialism and manners in Less Than Zero (1985), The Rules of Attraction (1987), American Psycho (1991), The Informers (1994) and Glamorama (1999).

The back cover of Lunar Park, his latest novel, conveys a warning: "Regardless of how horrible the events described here might seem, there's one thing you must remember as you hold this book in your hands: all of it really happened, every word is true."

The opening line: "You do an awfully good impression of yourself" plunges the reader into the maelstrom life of the novel's anti-hero and narrator, a fictional Bret Easton Ellis.

There are no apparent differences between the bete noire author and his alienated, narcissistic subject. Tongue in cheek, Easton Ellis plays hard and fast with reality and fiction, leaving the reader to come to his or her own conclusion regarding how much of the novel is autobiographical.

Lunar Park's protagonist, a wealthy writer in his early 40s, exists in a world that has become bizarrely complicated, bloated, and trivial: "My life - my name - had been rendered a repetitive, unfunny punch line and I was sick of eating it."

In an attempt to simplify his life and clear away the detritus that has amassed around him from too many years of fame, high living and moral impoverishment, the drug-addled narrator has married Jayne Dennis, the actress mother of his estranged son. The new family ostensibly settles into an idyllic suburban life.

Easton Ellis slices meticulously through the glitzy veneer of social pretension and daily absurdity: "When we sat down to eat I took inventory of the people in the room, and the remnants of my good mood evaporated when I realised how very little I had in common with them - the career dads, the responsible and diligent moms - and I was soon filled with dread and loneliness."

The dominant themes of the novel are love, loss, the complex relationships between fathers and sons, and the damage inflicted upon children by their parents. The narrator's father, a careless, abusive alcoholic, is now reduced to a bag of ashes in a safety deposit box, but the damage remains.

Easton Ellis finds himself trying to make up for his own irresponsibility by suddenly becoming a father to his neglected son and stepdaughter. The fact that he refuses to relinquish his anti-social behaviour and drug and alcohol abuse is overshadowed by paranormal events that begin to take place in the house at 307 Elsinore Lane.

Although Lunar Park is a novel about coming to terms with the devastation of personal history, it is a horror story created in homage to Stephen King complete with haunted house, furniture that rearranges itself, attacks by a possessed toy bird, and e-mails from beyond the grave. American Psycho slasher, Patrick Bateman, makes a guest appearance too.

The narrator's wife threatens to leave him, an attractive graduate student refuses to have sex with him, several of his son's contemporaries go missing and mutilated corpses start to materialise - Bateman style.

Can the dead come back to haunt the living? Can fictional characters come to life? Which is more destructive, aberrant psychic phenomena or parental abuse?

The fictional Easton Ellis is forced to confront his demons: "I want you to reflect on your life. I want you to be aware of all the terrible things you've done. I want you to face the disaster that is Bret Easton Ellis."

Uncharacteristically, the ending of Lunar Park provides resolution and a rare, tender glimpse of the author's personality: "I saw my father walking toward me - he was a child again and smiling and he was offering me an orange he held out with both hands... From those of us who are left behind: you will be remembered, you were the one I needed, I loved you in my dreams."

While some of the supernatural elements are hard to swallow, Lunar Park is an ambitious, clever and weirdly compelling combination of fantasy and fact. Whether you love or hate him, the world would be a less interesting and honest place without writers of his ilk; Easton Ellis is a barometer calibrating many of the worst aspects of "civilised" society.