"James Ellroy"@en . . . "In 2001, a customer inquired if Black Books had one of Ellroy's books on tape, much to Bernard Black's annoyance."@en . "James Ellroy"@en . "--03-04"^^ . . . "In 2001, a customer inquired if Black Books had one of Ellroy's books on tape, much to Bernard Black's annoyance."@en . . . "One of the quintessential Mad Artists of the 20th century, James Ellroy was born in 1948, and had a troubled childhood due to his parents' highly dysfunctional relationship that ended in their divorce. The key event in his life happened when he was just ten years old, when his mother was raped and murdered. The crime was never solved and Ellroy went to live with his father, who died seven years later. From there he dropped out of school and became a homeless, drug-addicted thief. After spending some time in jail he began to turn his life around by quitting drugs and getting a job as a caddy. However, his true passion became writing. His mother's murder had left him with a fascination of violent crime, much of it centered around the similar murder of aspiring actress Elizabeth Short, popularly known as the \"Black Dahlia\" case. One of his novels is a fictionalized account of the case to give Short a bit more closure than she received in real life, one of the biggest cases of Creator Breakdown in a career full of it. His books include lots of Black and Grey Morality and Deliberate Values Dissonance, as well as Loads and Loads of Characters."@en . . "Author"@en . . . . . . . . "hide"@en . . . . "Male"@en . "Human"@en . . "One of the quintessential Mad Artists of the 20th century, James Ellroy was born in 1948, and had a troubled childhood due to his parents' highly dysfunctional relationship that ended in their divorce. The key event in his life happened when he was just ten years old, when his mother was raped and murdered. The crime was never solved and Ellroy went to live with his father, who died seven years later. From there he dropped out of school and became a homeless, drug-addicted thief. After spending some time in jail he began to turn his life around by quitting drugs and getting a job as a caddy. However, his true passion became writing. His mother's murder had left him with a fascination of violent crime, much of it centered around the similar murder of aspiring actress Elizabeth Short, popula"@en .