Bright Lights, Big City by Jay McInerney

"It's six A.M. Do you know where you are?"

Bright Lights Big City was a sensation when first published in 1984. Jay McInerney’s name has forever been linked to a particular hedonistic New York lifestyle where cocaine, parties and dance clubs defined an era.

Reading some 30 years later the novel perfectly captures the mood of New York City at a time just before the AIDS crisis would fully take hold and before Bret Easton Ellis took the concept to the extreme in his depiction of professional psychopath Patrick Bateman in American Psycho (1991).

McInerney's pace is as frantic and desperate as the endless drug taking. In this version of New York the party goers live beneath a huge and swinging sword of Damocles; a precarious and unsustainable existence. 

No review of Bright Lights Big City can ignore the elephant in the room, the second person narrative. This unusual narrative style has, no doubt, caused more notes in the margin than anything else. Who could argue that the second person doesn’t work in the opening line; “You're not the kind of guy who would be in a place like this at this time of the morning”, which immediately hooks the reader into the story. The only problem is sustaining the tone throughout the whole novel. Patrick Bateman's first person narrative in American Psycho ultimately carries more resonance. 

Reservations about the narrative format aside this is a great landmark novel 4

Bright Lights Big City by Jay McInerney published by Vintage 182 pages