Blood on the Moon Audiobook By James Ellroy cover art

Blood on the Moon

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Blood on the Moon

By: James Ellroy
Narrated by: L. J. Ganser
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Detective Sergeant Lloyd Hopkins can't stand music, or any loud sounds. He's got a beautiful wife, but he can't get enough of other women. And instead of bedtime stories, he regales his daughters with bloody crime stories. He's a thinking man's cop with a dark past and an obsessive drive to hunt down monsters who prey on the innocent.

Now, there's something haunting him. He sees a connection in a series of increasingly gruesome murders of women committed over a period of 20 years. To solve the case, Hopkins will dump all the rules and risk his career to make the final link and get the killer.

©1984 James Ellroy (P)2010 Audio Go Thriller & Suspense Suspense Mystery Hard-Boiled Scary
Visceral Storytelling • Powerful Prose • Perfect Narration • Deeply Conflicted Protagonist • Propulsive Pacing

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My least favorite ellroy novel. Dont think he'd hit his pulp stage yet. Also my main gripe was the narrator was the absolute wrong one for this.

so so...

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If you can overlook the fact that many slurs are used throughout the book and that there are a few (but only a few) flat spots in the plot, you will love this in your face story all out slugfest of a genius serial killer on the loose. The MC detective is awesome. He has lots personal problems and he’s well aware of that fact. But if he loves you, he’ll take a bullet for you without hesitation. He’s a bipolar Travis McGee and I’m all in for the ride. Please remember the Pearl Clutcher’s are gonna clutch. Ignore them!!!
I hope you enjoy this trip as much as I did. Don’t take it personally or seriously and hang on for a great ride.
Perfect narration.

If….Travis McGee was a bipolar renegade cop with a great sense of humor, honor, a great big mouth and a chip on his shoulder.

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Where does Blood on the Moon rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

Probably in the middle. It wasn't the best but certainly wasn't the worst.

What did you like best about this story?

The twists and turns. At times they were hard to follow, but added to a good tale.

What does L. J. Ganser bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

He made the story. Without his narrative I don't believe I would have finished the story.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

When the past of the hero was finally revealed.

A VERY CONVOLUTED STORY

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I get it… noir but honestly unless you can overlook the author using N**ger and F**got about 1,000 times, you’ll be pretty distracted. Also, besides the general misogyny and WHACK ideas about how all gay men actually want to be women, NONE OF THE WOMEN IN THIS STORY MAKE SENSE. None of their reactions make sense, nothing they do makes sense. He does have a way with atmosphere and story. There are some fun bits but really not worth tolerating so much racism and misogyny.

Avoid if you’re offended by slurs

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Per Mr. Elroy: I write crime stories about Los Angeles 1940’s. Therefore my works mirrors life from the 1940’s and anything after this time is never included.

It’s important to keep this in mind as the reader, his books of that time are time capsules. People acted and talked very different from today. Heroes said what we today call terrible things. Wives put their husbands on pedestals. Crime was rampant and gritty. LAPD was brutally aggressive and hands on with people. Racism was tolerated, as was homophobia. Morals however were higher and there was a clear line in the sand between wrong and right. This all sounds like an oxymoron, and it is. But it’s the past. The past is NOT subjective. It’s important to know where we’ve come from to avoid future mistakes. Many surprised readers were turned off by the racial language, sexual assaults and violence within his books. However this writing must be interpreted in context. As previously written, anything after the 1940’s are not included in his crime novels set in the 1940’s.
Even Stephen King for the most part adds racial language and homophobia to his novels taking place in X time for realistic purposes.

Blood on the Moon is a visceral story about a young LA Police officer during circa 1940’s. Married with a daughter, he lives for being the best cop he can be and lives his job. He believes himself the first line of defense between innocents and depraved lunatics.
He has extramarital affairs, drinks too much coffee and hunts down criminals, both civilians and other cops with old fashioned police work.
Enter the depraved lunatic. We are given glimpses for why he does what he does and a front seat into his bloody hobby. There are many other interesting characters in this novel who either are there to push the story forward or just there. Same as life’s experience of the day to day interacting with others around us.

Mr. Elroy’s writing is poetic, violent, funny and heartbreaking. I would encourage anyone who’s interested in a crime novel of this time period to give it a listen.

Great Story by a Great Man

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