Although Tod's passion for painting started plummeting as soon as he graduated from art school, he finds himself reinvigorated by the weirdos and nutjobs littered along the Sunset Strip. It's like he hit the jackpot of artistic inspiration.

Tod is frustrated by the clichéd nature of most modern paintings. Think about it this way—Tod wants to create something as impactful as "Starry Night," while his peers are content with painting dogs sitting around a poker table.

At this point in his life, Tod is pretty okay with selling out. Whatever puts bread on the table, right? Luckily for him, however, he discovers that Los Angeles is filled with a wealth of artistic inspiration. Okay, so it's not exactly the prettiest or most polite inspiration in the world, but we're pretty sure that Tod doesn't mind one bit.

Contradictions between individuals and their clothes appear quite frequently in the novel. Although the idea of wearing "sports clothes" while not playing sports might not seem all that weird in today's era of basketball shorts and running shoes, it's a disparity well worth noting.

This is a nice way of saying that Tod is funny looking. Still, you'd be wrong to peg him as a simpleton. Although you might end up detesting many aspects of Tod's personality by the end of the novel, there's no debating the fact that he's a complex guy. Whether that's a good thing, however, is entirely up for debate.

Tod is obsessed with "the people who come to California to die." Although we don't understand this oft-repeated phrase at first, it quickly becomes clear that these people—whoever they are—are driven by feelings of disappointment. They come to California because there's nothing else for them, and they soon realize that California doesn't have anything for them, either. And that's never a good thing, folks.

We start things off with Tod, who looks more like a dude stocking shelves at Wal-Mart than a mega-talented visual artist. No wonder Faye refuses to give him the time of day. Regardless, his relatable appearance helps put people at ease with him in the seedy underbelly of Los Angeles.

Hollywood features a ton of different architectural styles thrown together with no rhyme or reason. It's like the tackiest thing ever. On a symbolic level, however, this imagery seems to be a critique of the inauthenticity at the core of life in Tinseltown.