Have a book club brings so much value to my personal development. Meeting each month with friends and discussing a common topic is so rewarding. This meeting we read The Black Dahlia. Check out my honest opinion and get some great fall book club ideas!
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In October, we gathered at Kirsten’s house for a Halloween book club meeting. I had just received my new iPhone in the mail so I was snapping away at all the wonderful food items. Kirsten made good use of pumpkins for crackers and dip. Great idea Kirst!
She had hot apple cider brewing away on the stove when we arrived and it smelled so good in the house.
And, she made a beautiful pumpkin dessert.
Now onto the book. It seemed appropriate to discuss such a murder thriller in October with Halloween – the Black Dahlia by James Ellroy. I use Audible quite often to ‘read’ my books while in the car. And in this case, I’m glad I did.
I had seen James Ellroy’s movie ‘LA Confidential’, written 9 years before the Black Dahlia and there were many similarities in the stories. So much so I had the case of de-ja-vu. I felt that he took material from that book and just re-wrote it and expanded it. But then I learned that it was in fact a series of books that expanded on and used some of the same characters. Knowing that now, I would have liked to read the series. (White Jazz, LA Confidential, The Big Nowhere, and the Black Dahlia.)
This book is very gritty and brutal. It’s set in 1950’s Los Angeles. It’s about crooked cops, hookers, deception, murder, and it contains about every slang racial slur you can imagine. Funny, some of us were too young to understand some of the slurs. I’m glad I didn’t live in that time-frame.
Again, not a book I think I would have picked up on my own to read. And if I were asked if I liked it….uhhh..not really. It was too long. There were parts of it that seemed to get good, excitement built, and then it would drag on for pages (hours when you’re listening to it) and it seemed to take away from the energy of the story.
What are your thoughts on The Black Dahlia? I’d love to know what you thought in the comment section below.
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