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James Ellroy was born in Los Angeles in 1948. He is the author of the acclaimed L.A. Quartet - The Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, LA Confidential and White Jazz, as well as the Underworld USA trilogy: American Tabloid, The Cold Six Thousand and Blood's a Rover. He is the author of one work of non-fiction, The Hilliker Curse: My Pursuit of Women. Ellroy lives in Los Angeles.
James Ellroy's website
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In the opening paragraph of American Tabloid you write that
"America was never innocent." How does this theme further evolve in The
Cold Six Thousand?
America was founded on a bedrock of land grabs, slavery, religious extremism,
colonial ambition, and genocide. The notion that America was innocent prior to
Jack Kennedy's murder is preposterous; by the rules he lived by, Jack got what
he deserved. He took aid from organized crime during the 1960 election; he
repaid the debt by siccing his kid brother Bobby on the Mob at large. He
betrayed the Cuban exiles at the Bay of Pigs. He pissed off a hot-headed troika
of mobsters, exiles and renegade CIA men involved in the Cuban cause. They
whacked him for it. His death derived from the perennial motives of money and
turf. It was a gaudy homicide that set the stage for the out-of-control America
that I portray in The Cold Six Thousand.
So you really think the Mob called the hits on JFK, Martin Luther King Jr,
and Bobby Kennedy?
I'm convinced that the Mob, in cahoots with Cuban exiles and renegade CIA
elements, whacked Jack Kennedy. That said, I'm a novelist -- and my job is the
creation of verisimilitude, not the exposition of literal truth. There is no
...
Joseph Nicholas Gores (1931-2011) was born in Rochester, Minnosota and educated at Notre Dame University and Stanford University. He also served in the US Army, where he wrote biographies of generals. After earning a master's... (more)
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Walter Mosley is one of America's most celebrated and beloved writers. A Grand Master of the Mystery Writers of America, he has won numerous awards, including the Anisfield-Wolf Award, a Grammy, a PEN USA's Lifetime ... (more)
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