SUICIDE HILL: A SGT. LLOYD HOPKINS NOVEL OF SUSPENSE

New York City, NY: The Mysterious Press, 1985. First Edition. First Printing.. Hardcover. Fine/Fine Dust Jacket.. New York City, NY: The Mysterious Press, 1985. Hardcover. Fine/Fine. First Edition/First Printing. 280 pages. The author's fourth novel. The third volume of James Ellroy's "Sgt. Lloyd Hopkins" trilogy. The First Hardcover Edition. Precedes and should not be confused with all other subsequent editions. Published in a small and limited first print run as a hardcover original only. The First Edition is now scarce. Presents James Ellroy's "Suicide Hill: A Sgt. Lloyd Hopkins Novel of Suspense". The final "Sgt. Lloyd Hopkins" novel. Preceded by "Blood On The Moon" (1984) and "Because The Night" (1985) , "turning point" novels that permanently define Los Angeles as the "noir" genre of our time and compel us to stick it out with his anti-hero, who can be as mean and fatally flawed as the villains he pursues, a genuine literary character, the "antidote to the sensitive, candy-assed philosophizing private eye" of yore. "Tracks down a kidnapper and discovers among his colleagues a complex web of power, corruption, and lies. Exhibits the seminal hallmarks of Ellroy's taut, haunting prose. His dark and disturbing portrait of Hopkins, a thoroughly unlikable protagonist, drives the novel with unrelenting force, taking readers down paths they might not really want to explore. He has created 'a complex monument to a basically shitty guy', and in doing so, laid the groundwork for the novels that have earned him a seat at the table of truly great crime novelists" (L. A. Smith) . The novel, in particular, anticipates the sprawling LA police corruption laid bare in "LA Confidential" (1990) . An absolute "must-have" title for James Ellroy collectors. This copy is very boldly and beautifully signed and inscribed in black ink-pen on the front free endpaper by the author: "Reader, this book is a blow job from Satan, James Ellroy". It is signed directly on the page itself, not on a tipped-in page. There is no recipient named. Because his signature is merely a scrawl, the provocative and sometimes scandalous inscriptions he wrote early in his career dramatically enhance the collectible value of a signed copy. This title is a late-modern classic. As far as we know, this is the only such signed and scandalously inscribed copy of the First Hardcover Edition/First Printing available online and is in especially fine condition: Clean, crisp, and bright. It is the absolute best signed and inscribed copy we have ever seen from Ellroy. A rare signed copy thus. One of the most brilliant writers of our time. A fine collectible copy. (SEE ALSO OTHER JAMES ELLROY TITLES IN OUR CATALOG). ISBN 0892962356.