The Rules of Attraction
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4.3 • 111 Ratings
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
From the New York Times bestselling author or Less Than Zero and American Psycho—a startlingly funny, kaleidoscopic novel about three students at a small, affluent liberal-arts college in New England with no plans for the future—or even the present—who become entangled in a romantic triangle. • “An extraordinary writer.” —LA Weekly
Bret Easton Ellis trains his incisive gaze on the kids at self-consciously bohemian Camden College and treats their sexual posturings and agonies with a mixture of acrid hilarity and compassion while exposing the moral vacuum at the center of their lives.
Lauren changes boyfriends every time she changes majors and still pines for Victor who split for Europe months ago and she might or might not be writing anonymous love letter to ambivalent, hard-drinking Sean, a hopeless romantic who only has eyes for Lauren, even if he ends up in bed with half the campus, and Paul, Lauren's ex, forthrightly bisexual and whose passion masks a shrewd pragmatism. They waste time getting wasted, race from Thirsty Thursday Happy Hours to Dressed To Get Screwed parties to drinks at The Edge of the World or The Graveyard. The Rules of Attraction is a poignant, hilarious take on the death of romance.
The basis for the major motion picture starring James Van Der Beek, Shannyn Sossamon, Jessica Biel, and Kate Bosworth.
Look for Bret Easton Ellis’s new novel, The Shards!
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This tale of privileged college students at their self- absorbed and childish worst is the very book that countless students have dreamed of writing at their most self-absorbed and childish moments. With one bestseller to his credit, Less Than Zero author and recent Bennington College graduate Ellis has had the unique opportunity of seeing his dream become a realityand all those other once-and-future students can breathe a sigh of relief that it didn't happen to them. Through a series of brief first-person accounts, the novel chronicles one term at a fictional New England college, with particular emphasis on a decidedly contemporary love triangle (one woman and two men) in which all possible combinations have been explored, and each pines after the one who's pining after the other. Theirs is a world of physical, chemical and emotional excessan adolescent fantasy of sex, drugs and sturm und drangwherein characters are distinguished only by the respective means by which they squander their health, wealth and youth. Despite its contemporary feel and flashy structurethe book begins and ends midsentencethe narrative relies on the stalest staples of melodrama and manages to pack in a suicide, assorted suicide attempts, an abortion and the death of a parent without giving the impression that anything is happeningor that any of it matters. Major ad/promo.
Customer Reviews
Great book...
The movie was just as great. I hope iTunes adds it at some point.
Worst Bret book
But it's still okay. My problem is it's length--not that I mind long books, but this could have been edited significantly. Also I wish I didn't see the (awful) movie first...
College through a mirror darkly
Loved the characters in this one. Paul was my favorite.His obsession with Mitchell and the way Mitchell sought to hide their relationship was one of the saddest and elegiac parts of the book. Hated Sean with a passion. He was one of those terse, dull characters who always seemed to mistake being inarticulate and crude for cool and brooding like James Dean or something.
Lauren was an interesting mix, a little too passive for my tastes, always wanted her to show some backbone, to be a little more active in the way she approached her relationships. That scene with the Reaganite in the beginning was a perfect way to demonstrate it from the outset.
Her relationship with Sean was boring, both of them were the least interesting people in the book. I always wanted to see the relationship alluded to between her and Paul instead of just hearing about it. Otherwise, the book was ok. Movie sucked though.