Bret Easton Ellis' "The Rules of Attraction" (The Rules of Attraction - Bret Easton Ellis)

Member Name: jbsabbath

Product:	The Rules of Attraction - Bret Easton Ellis
Date:	08/04/09 (83 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Hugely detailed, enjoyable narrative, interesting despicable characters

Disadvantages: Lacks much of a conclusion, if it needed one, sometimes feels unrealistic

"Maybe their lover left them, maybe that copy of 'Speaking in Tongues' *was* really scratched... But then I came to understand sitting there... that these problems and the pain they felt were genuine. I mean, this girl probably had a lot of money and so did her dumb-looking boyfriend. Other people might not sympathize with this couple's problems and maybe they didn't really matter in the larger realm of things - but they still mattered to Jeff and Susie; these problems hurt them, these things stung.... Now that's what struck me as *really* pathetic. I forgot about her and the other geeks and did some more of the coke Lars was offering me...."

Welcome to Camden College, home to numerous wasters, nymphos and drug-peddlers, all one-track minded to blag their way through education, scoring pills, pot and coke wherever they can find it, screwing around constantly in numerous toga-themed orgies, and living for the big parties: 'Dress to get Screwed' and 'End of the World', leaving piss, blood and vomit stains in their wake.

Cynical and self-centred Sean Bateman believes the world revolves around him, willingly going to bed with whoever he wants and smoking endless amounts of weed, seemingly never having attended a single lecture in his time at Camden.

With his rich family behind him, he takes little of the college life seriously and plays by his own rules.

Conservative and easily-jealous Paul Denton is a young bisexual whose main use of time is eyeing everyone up, commenting on their phsyical characteristics and whether he would like to bed them.

Although he, like Sean, likes to sleep around, he is one of the more likely candidates for a long-lasting monogamous relationship.

Talking of sleeping around, finally we have Lauren Hynde who, let's be honest, is obsessed with her boyfriend Victor who went to Europe months ago and hasn't bothered to contact her - she thinks about him every hour of every day, and in every conversation something will remind her of him.

Even though her mind is completely focussed on Victor, she goes to bed with numerous partners, partly in an effort to get over him and partly just because she can.

Lauren and Paul used to date but that's over now - Sean thinks Lauren has been sending him love notes and he lusts after her, hell-bent on getting her into bed, while Paul seduces Sean on the sidelines and all of their feelings get mixed up in a strange love triangle.

But those love notes aren't coming from Lauren but rather someone in the shadows; Victor is on his way back from Europe; and Sean is failing three out of his four classes.

Amid the parties, drugs and sex, can the three of them last until the end of term?

Told from numerous first-person viewpoints, Sean, Paul and Lauren being the central three, "The Rules of Attraction" is Bret Easton Ellis' second novel, published in 1987, and may well be seen as a social commentary on 80s US college promiscuity, even though it is heavily stylised and at times seemingly unrealistic.

The central trio, like most of the book's characters, have few likeable traits, and as the opening quote describes: even though they have their health, money and comfort, these are people who think they have it tough, genuinely believing that their world is a real struggle, not giving a second thought to anyone less fortunate than themselves.

This is one of the overriding themes of the novel, as is your constant dislike of each and every one of them, be it for their drinking, their drug-taking or their sleeping around, or for their horrendous politic-fueled artistic lingo that smells of college socialists believing they can put the world to rights through arguments and speeches.

Ellis often litters the novel with it:

"'Spielberg has gone too far on this one,' the angry mulatto intellectual with the neoBeatnik casual but hip look plus beret who has joined the table hisses."

It takes a lot of getting used to from the get-go, as does the constant changes in narrative as it shifts from character to character, but by the time you reach a third through the book the going gets easier.

Some might be interested in the short introduction we get to Patrick Bateman, Sean's brother, who in Ellis' next novel turned out to be the "American Psycho".

Certainly "American Psycho" is a masterclass novel and certainly not for the squeamish, holding nothing back, and, similarly, rarely does "The Rules of Attraction" miss in its punches.

It's not quite as graphic as one might expect, however, sometimes feeling like it's glossing over some situations, but the key is down to the different viewpoints and the different interpretations of what is going on.

Some scenes are briefly played out twice, so we might get the same conversation repeated but remembered slightly differently, and this is all brilliantly done.

For example, Paul is very open in his relationship with Sean, constantly thinking he's got to keep an eye on his activities should he be cheated on, while Sean barely mentions Paul when he gets a chance to talk - it's almost as if the two of them never met.

These differences in their stories begs the question as to what is real and what is not - what actually happened and what was fiction?

Fiction and reality are woven together and Ellis creates a truly effective narrative that feels like it shouldn't work, but it does.

"The Rules of Attraction" is a very enjoyable read, sometimes garnering laugh-out-loud moments, but often leaving you feeling disgusted with the characters' activities.

Perhaps it is not as brilliant or as hard-hitting as "American Psycho", but I would certainly recommend it.

[The book can be purchased from play.com for £5.99 (at time of writing), including postage and packing]

Summary: Excellent stylised college-life drama from the eyes of 3 sex-mad students!