my guest today has been called america s greatest living crime writer. in his la quartet and many other novels, james ellroy has painted a uniquely dark portrait of this city of angels, a nightmare world of psychotic killers, corrupt cops and depraved appetites. ellroy writes of what he knows, his own mother was murdered when he was a child. and is that simple, terrible fact the key to understanding all the words he s ever written? james ellroy, welcome to hardtalk. hey, boss, what s shaking? we are going to talk about 35 years of novel writing and of your books has been set in and around los angeles. absolutely untrue right off the bat, bam. i ve wrote three novels, the underworld usa trilogy, the american tabloid, which was time magazine s novel of the year year in 1995. the cold six thousand and blood s a rover are set outside la. right, but southern california is your world. i m from there and it s where i go when women divorce me. i suppose what i m getting at is wheth