Home › Literary Fiction › Less Than Zero
A rich college student returns to Los Angeles for winter break
1985Fast paceDark
What it is about
Clay comes home from college for Christmas and finds his old friends living in a haze of drugs, parties and boredom. The novel is told in a flat, detached style. It was Ellis’s debut.
Who will enjoy it
Mature readers who want a landmark of 1980s fiction.
What you will get
Contains drug use and graphic content.
Less Than Zero Movie: Screen Adaptation
Less Than Zero Facts: Pages, Genre and Setting
Genre
Literary Fiction · Los Angeles · Excess · 1980s
Length
208 pages · ≈ 6 h
More about this book
Characters
Clay and his friends.
Setting
Los Angeles in the 1980s.
What makes it different
A cold, short novel about wealthy teenagers.
Feel
Flat, bleak and unsettling.
American Psycho
How Late It Was, How Late
The Sellout
Black Swan Green
A Brief History of Seven Killings
The Line of Beauty
The Orphan Master's Son
The Secret History