24

WEDNESDAY

I hand James Ellroy an advance copy of My Dark Places, his psychotic memoir of his exhaustive search for his mother’s killer, and ask him to sign it. “Where’d you get this?” he says evenly, almost deadpan, while still insinuating he’s going to smashmouth me. “I’m going to review it for the Washington City Paper,” I tremble. “What’s that, the local commie rag?” he growls. “Yeah,” I mumble. “You gonna give it a good review?” he asks. “Yeah,” I admit. “Goooooood!” he smiles, nodding at my suit coat. “Nice jacket,” he says, scrawling “She Lives!” across my edition of his obsession. Even as the movie version of his L.A. Confidential opens to raves, Ellroy reads from My Dark Places at 7 p.m. at Olsson’s, 1200 F St. NW. FREE. (202) 347-3686. (Christopher Porter)