SUMMARY:Ellroy's memoir centered around his reopening of the investigation of his mother's unsolved murder. The book evolved from an article Ellroy wrote for GQ Magazine about the experience of viewing his mother's homicide file.

PUBLISHER'S TEASER:

"On the night of 21 June 1958, Geneva Hilliker Ellroy left her home in El Monte, California. She was found strangled the next day. Her ten-year-old son James had been away with Jean's estranged husband all weekend and was confronted with the news on his return.

"Jean's murderer was never found, but her death had an enduring effect on her son who spent his teen and early adult years as a wino, petty burglar and derelict. Only later, through his obsession with crime fiction, an obsession triggered by his mother's murder, did Ellroy begin to delve into his past. Shortly after the publication of his ground-breaking novel White Jazz, Ellroy determined to return to Los Angeles and, with the help of veteran detective Bill Stoner, attempt to solve the thirty-eight-year-old crime.

"The result is one of the few classics of crime non-fiction and autobiography to appear in the last decades, a hypnotic trip to America's underbelly and one man's tortured soul."

—© CENTURY

POINTS:

In terms of first trade editions, the Century version of My Dark Places hit stands in the U.K. ahead of its American cousin. The earliest, and most desirable edition of My Dark Places, however, came in the form of an elaborate limited edition. Scorpion Press Limited released an elegant, exceedingly rare edition of the Ellroy memoir, utilizing pages gathered from the Century first edition. The Scorpion version of My Dark Places was produced in two states.

The first version consists of 85 signed and numbered copies bound in crimson marbled boards joined by a red leather spine emblazoned with gold-lettering.

A deluxe edition, not for sale but instead produced for "private" distribution, was produced in a lettered-state of 15 copies (pictured). These were also bound in crimson marbled boards intended to evoke "stream of consciousness." The spine of the lettered edition, however, consists of crimson-stained goat skin with raised bands emblazoned with gold-leaf lettering.

The numbered- and lettered-editions were both distributed in a clear acetate wrap. Because the Ellroy book was the first limited edition memoir produced by Scorpion — and, because Ellroy balked — the imprint broke with tradition and did not incorporate an introduction written by another mystery writer, a hallmark of all other Scorpion limited editions. Beautiful pieces of work, values of both Scorpion versions of My Dark Places are steadily rising. As the rare, deluxe state becomes more widely known on the collector’s market, it may well eventually become the most collectible of Ellroy first editions. If the planned filmed adaptation of My Dark Places, starring David Duchovny is successful, the Scorpion limited edition could mimic the metoric collectibility rise of the limited edition of L.A. Confidential.

Order the book My Dark Places: An L.A. Crime Memoir

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