With autofiction in vogue, its exponents try to gain purchase on the truth through concerted self-exposure. But maybe, to understand someone, you need to look at their dreams.
Ellis’ latest is another pseudo-memoir like Lunar Park. In a Dickensian move, Ellis serialised this novel on his podcast to his agent’s chagrin.
Bret is in his last year at Buckley, a private school in LA, concealing his homosexuality. When the overwhelmingly handsome yet sinister Robert Mallory joins their senior year, he threatens to divide Bret’s tight-knit group. Meanwhile, home invasions and a serial killer are haunting LA. Could Mallory be connected to these macabre events? Or is it only Bret’s fevered, writerly imagination?
During its podcast serialisation, the blurriness regarding how much was autobiographical was a thrill. That was until the plot stretched credulity too far. Still, that these events have some basis in reality gives this thing a charge – the relationships feel like they come from the pressure of experience. Tellingly, the break-up of two of Bret’s cherished friends carries as much weight as the murder of another.
At 594 pages long, some bridging scenes could be culled for a tighter read, but The Shards is consistently engrossing. A return to form, the blend of confessional writing and horror-mystery makes for an addictively propulsive brew. Some may find one of the ending’s dangling possibilities a meta cop-out, not baked enough into what’s preceded. But Ellis has worked up so much goodwill, and the ending is sufficiently ambiguous, that this misstep is forgiven. For sheer enjoyment this ranks among Ellis’ very best.
What’s most endearing is Ellis’ vulnerability here. The Shards is a fascinating, intertextual companion piece to Less Than Zero; throughout, teenage Bret works on that debut, honing its detached aesthetic. It’s as though Ellis has become tired of the dead-eyed numbness and wants to dig behind that affectless facade. This is the origin story of Ellis’ numbness, a thawing of that studied indifference. When his trademark gruesomeness arrives, it’s more jolting as we’re not benumbed.
The Shards is the culmination of Ellis’ strengths. He has become a more integrated author: his signature provocations and meta elements have coalesced into a more humane package. The schlocky artifice is a smokescreen letting the more truthful, autobiographical currents come through.
