Biography for
Bret Easton Ellis More at IMDbPro »

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His influences include: Hemingway, Joan Didion, Joyce, Flaubert, and Dennis Cooper; plus books, movies, TV and rock and roll.

Simon and Schuster gave him a $300,000 advance for American Psycho then refused to publish it after women's groups and women within the company protested. Luckily, the book was picked up by Vintage.

Was 21 when his first novel was published (Less Than Zero, 1985) while Bret was still a student at Bennington College).

Played keyboards in some new wave bands in the early 1980s.

Received numerous death threats and hate mail after the publication of his graphically violent novel American Psycho. Today, the novel is considered by many his best work yet.

In his novel "American Psycho", he borrowed a character from Tana Janowitz's short story collection "Slaves of New York" (Stash) and a character from Jay McInerney's book "Story of My Life" (Alison Poole). In a recent interview he said that the inclusion of Alison Poole was because he was upset at McInerney over something (he couldn't recall) and his revenge was to have her attacked by Patrick Bateman. She then appeared in his novel "Glamorama."

Is close friends with fellow novelist Jay McInerney.

Has cross-referenced characters in his books. For example, Blair and Julian from "Less Than Zero" are mentioned in "The Informers", Sean Bateman from "The Rules of Attraction" is the younger brother of Patrick Bateman in "American Psycho".

Where Are They Now

(February 2009) Working on his 7th novel and sequel to "Less Than Zero", entitled "Imperial Bedrooms". Expected release is 2010.

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