Royal Scandal, Hollywood Crime, Nail Salon Drama: Pajiba October 2025 Book Recommendations Superpost
What Books Are You Reading This Month?
By Kayleigh Donaldson | Books | November 3, 2025
Widespread Panic by James Ellroy
What is everyone currently reading? I’m back on the James Ellroy train. Yes, Ellroy has been my main literary obsession of 2025, and I don’t plan on stopping anytime soon. The demon dog of crime fiction is too compelling for me to abandon, even if he is a genuine weirdo.
Widespread Panic is surprisingly short by Ellroy’s standards—my edition runs 336 pages—but it is rich in detail. The protagonist, Freddy Otash, is a familiar face from Ellroy’s Underworld USA series and a fascinating figure in Hollywood history.
Otash was a former LAPD officer and private investigator known for his work as a fixer and researcher for the tabloid magazine Confidential. If you needed a mess cleaned up or created, you called Otash.
- Notably, he was hired by Peter Lawford to investigate Marilyn Monroe, which sparked decades of conspiracy theories about Monroe’s connection to JFK.
- Widespread Panic chronicles his shady activities in the early 1950s, as he mingled with and confronted Tinseltown’s elite.
This book stands out from Ellroy’s previous works in its unexpected speculative turn: Otash narrates the story from purgatory, delivering a raw monologue of his life and crimes to a hopefully forgiving higher power.
“If you needed a mess cleaned up or created, you called Otash.”
“Otash is narrating this story from purgatory, offering a no-holds-barred monologue of his life and crimes to a hopefully forgiving higher force.”
Author's summary: James Ellroy’s Widespread Panic offers a gripping dive into Hollywood’s dark secrets through the eyes of Freddy Otash, blending true crime with a unique afterlife perspective.