Name: ellie's review of Exquisite Corpse by Poppy Z. Brite
Item: Exquisite Corpse
Rating: 4
Author: ellie

Poppy Z. Brite

From the author of Lost Souls, Drawing Blood, and Wormwood comes a thrilling and chilling novel that bestselling author Peter Straub says serves as a “guidebook to hell.” To serial slayer Andrew Compton, murder is an art, the most intimate art. After feigning his own death to escape from prison, Compton makes his way to the United States with the sole ambition of bringing his “art” to new heights. Tortured by his own perverse desires, and drawn to possess and destroy young boys, Compton inadvertently joins forces with Jay Byrne, a dissolute playboy who has pushed his “art” to limits even Compton hadn’t previously imagined. Together, Compton and Byrne set their sights on an exquisite young Vietnamese-American runaway, Tran, whom they deem to be the perfect victim. Swiftly moving from the grimy streets of London’s Piccadilly Circus to the decadence of the New Orleans French Quarter, Poppy Z. Brite dissects the landscape of torture and invites us into the mind of a killer. Exquisite Corpse confirms Brite as a writer who defies categorization. It is a novel for those who dare trespass where the sacred and profane become one.

Exquisite Corpse

From the author of Lost Souls, Drawing Blood, and Wormwood comes a thrilling and chilling novel that bestselling author Peter Straub says serves as a “guidebook to hell.”

To serial slayer Andrew Compton, murder is an art, the most intimate art. After feigning his own death to escape from prison, Compton makes his way to the United States with the sole ambition of bringing his “art” to new heights. Tortured by his own perverse desires, and drawn to possess and destroy young boys, Compton inadvertently joins forces with Jay Byrne, a dissolute playboy who has pushed his “art” to limits even Compton hadn’t previously imagined. Together, Compton and Byrne set their sights on an exquisite young Vietnamese-American runaway, Tran, whom they deem to be the perfect victim.

Swiftly moving from the grimy streets of London’s Piccadilly Circus to the decadence of the New Orleans French Quarter, Poppy Z. Brite dissects the landscape of torture and invites us into the mind of a killer. Exquisite Corpse confirms Brite as a writer who defies categorization. It is a novel for those who dare trespass where the sacred and profane become one.

Aimee :)

Tran fell out of his binding straps and melted slowly into Jay's ribcage. A large, viscous, faintly iridescent stain ate up the concrete floor around them. Their eyes were black caverns.

They gave birth to worms, generation after generation, until their bodies were covered as if in a living blanket. Soon they were picked clean, their bones an ivory sculpture-puzzle shining in the dark, waiting to tell their mute love story.

Once again, I slowed my pulse, my breathing, my involuntary functions to nearly nothing. I had not known if I could do it a second time. As I slipped under, I felt a vast relief. The desert was days away. This time I did not need or want to pass for dead. I wanted only to keep Jay's meat in me as long as I could, to process and assimiliate as much of him as possible. When I awoke, he would be with me always, and all the world's pleasures would be ours to revel in.

bathed him in the tub, washed the blood from his stiffening hair and his white skin, dried him, and laid him gently on the bed. And I had my time with him, this new Jay who did not and could not resist me, who never protested when I tore new holes in him, who minded not at all when I sallowed one of his testes like a salty raw oyster. 

I felt his world's foundations tremble as he realized that he was in the presence of a creature worse than himself.

And so, at what was to have been the moment of our greatest communion, Jay and I were separated forever.

‘I don’t know you.’ Luke sobbed as he jammed the blade behind Jay’s left ear and dragged it along the path of Jay’s jugular.

Jay raised his head as Luke came crashing through the window. Long strips of glistening flesh dangled from his open mouth and dripped from his chin. The stranger was chewing something too.

Arthur feeding from Jay's mouth, their lips purpled with dark blood, their jaws chewing the stringy flesh in unison. His own dear flesh.

He saw them through a haze of red. The pain began to recede. He felt dreamy, weightless, very cold. The thought that it was nearly over soothed him like a lover's touch. Tran closed his eyes and did not open them again.

Then the long fillet blade was sliding through his Resh, a shuddery cold sensation like the sick shock of a papercut multiplied a thousand times. At the same moment, Arthur thrust deep into him and ejaculated. The sperm burned like bleach and salt on his torn inner tissues.

The cold blade twisted inside him, severed some tough membrane with an agonizing crunch, sank into vital softness. Tran heard his own blood pattering onto the table, felt it pooling warmly beneath his back and buttocks. Blood filled his throat, welled past the gag and trickled out the corners of his mouth.

He was yanked back by the white heat of Jay's teeth in his belly. Not just in his skin or even his flesh but down in his guts, pushing back the edges and thrusting deep inside, ripping something out of him.

‘Killing you.’ A ghost of a smile touched Jay’s lips, but not his pale eyes.

'No, I don't understand.' Luke ground his face into the wall. He was nearly sobbing. I don't understand how you can find a kid naked and bleeding on the street and give him back to the guy who probably did it to him. ‘I don't understand how you can take a bribe from that freak and forget about the kid’s safety.’

Tran was his rightful lover in this world. He had shucked the ballast of WHIV, and he no longer cared whether he finished his novel. This was the real story, the only one whose ending he still cared about.

The gate slid soundlessly open and our Tran was through the widening gap in a flash, naked and bloody, but free.

Then I saw that it was a Phillips screwdriver in quite a large size. He took the blade in his mouth, coated it lightly with spit. Then he pulled Tran's legs up, exposing the tender crack between the silken buttocks, and he jammed the screwdriver into the centre of that crack. At the same time he bent again and bit deeply into Tran's left nipple.

In a few hours he would have to conjure up something for dinner, something simple but exquisite, some toothsome delicacy.

Something suitable for a beautiful boy's last meal.

‘I don’t want to redesign the world, I just want to take it down with me.'

But I'm Lush Rimbaud, and I refuse to shut up or die. And I waste what little breath I have left talking trash about people like you who've made an actual difference in the world. I know I never have and never will.

Jay was indeed the splendid young animal of the night.

But I had tamed him just enough to show who was the master.

I stopped fucking him. When he glanced over his shoulder, I saw tears on his face. ‘I mean it. If you're going to rape me, do it right. Make every cell in my body belong to you.’

Our eyes locked and something passed between us, something that changed this from an act of rape to an act of love, more intimate than killing the boy together had been.

Without quite realizing what I was about to do - I had subdued so many boys in just the same way - I gave him a quick, sharp clip on the jaw.

I'd only stunned him. Quickly I removed the cuffs from Birdy's wrists and fastened them on Jay's. I didn't bother with the ankle restraints. I wouldn't mind if he thrashed a bit.

‘I can't say that. If I loved you, I don't think we'd both still be alive. But I know you, Andrew, and that's something I've never said to anyone else.'

'We must have him,' I said with utter confidence, 'and we shall have him.'

Jay shook his head violently. 'I already told you there's no way we can. Tran's a local kid.

"It is of no consequence. I want him. I want to eat him, Jay?

‘I know his inflections, his phrases, even the way he clears his throat. Haven't you ever been in love?'

don't know what your story is, but you're not in prison now. Nobody's going to kill you. Stay with me? His eyes shone. 'Play with me.’

'Yes.' I slid my arms around his narrow waist, leaned into him. 'I think I can do that.'

ellie

The definition of "art isn't always fun". This book is not an easy read by any means. Extremely gory and graphic, but it's a very very good perspective on the AIDS crisis in the 1980s and 90s. It's really well written, and I'd recommend a read if you can handle extreme, grotesque details of gore and violence!

Max Riley

Yet another to add to my collection of “favorite books that I’ll never recommend to anyone”. This one is for the Hannibal girlies for sure.

Bowie 

This book is meant to be disturbing, so it is definitely rated kind of highly for that alone. So many parts of this just made me feel so gross, but even then i found myself somewhat getting attached to these despicable characters, which honestly makes me feel weird. I did find some POVs boring, i liked being with the murderers because i wanted to read more about their mindset. I did get bored often, which is why it’s not rated any higher. Not to mention, i feel like the story began when i was over 60% in this book, where the two characters meet and that’s not really enough in my opinion.

extremely odd and uncomfortable, could be written a hundred times over though. boring gore fest

donna 

eerrrmmm would have been a really great gorey splatterpunk gay mess but i was heavily distracted by the author's obvious asian fetish? u could not go two pages about the only asian character without reading something that sounds like it was said by a (white) person who was alive when they discovered electricity. i would include an example but i don't have the mental energy.. i'm just going to let u know i had to read the term "rice queen" more than once and the word "oriental" like forty billion times!!!!! LOL!!!!! and because this bothered me so bad i obviously had to look up to see if other people felt the same and saw very little commentary about it (which doesn't surprise me as a majority of the enjoyers of this subgenre are hwhite as hell) but did see that the two main serial killer characters were heavily based off of dahmer and nielsen, and that the death of tran - the exploited and sole asian character other than his stereotype of a father - was based!!! on a real life murder of a 14 year old!!!! i am going to barf!! the only redeeming quality this book has is that the writing is beautiful, but again i was distracted by how awful other aspects were. it's a shame! 

riss

jess larry

dnf at 33%, trop de blabla not enough action

Amanda Autumn Berrey

Alex Hauger

Maria Kais

Rowan Myers

It's odd, reading this book a few times over the course of the twenty years it's been around. As a kid, I thought it was this super deep love story. As a twenty something, I related to my friends succumbing to disease. (Certainly not as much as those who lived through the eighties, but the idea of getting any STI was terrifying, the idea that sex and my body could hold death, anathema to how I saw sex).

As a 35 year old, I see the hedonism and the fear. Luke, my least favorite character, became the one I wished was the protagonist.

It took me a looooong time to finish this. i’m a lover of the macabre and the disgusting but this is next level. advanced spooky readers only. the author knows exactly how to describe something horrific and do it without a dusting of purple prose to make it easier to digest. it sits heavy in the stomach and makes everything taste sour for a bit. in the best way. 

i will say i was more emotionally attached to Andrew than Jay, but them together scratched that fucked up itch i have for murderous couples. 

castor

It took me a looooong time to finish this. i’m a lover of the macabre and the disgusting but this is next level. advanced spooky readers only. the author knows exactly how to describe something horrific and do it without a dusting of purple prose to make it easier to digest. it sits heavy in the stomach and makes everything taste sour for a bit. in the best way. 

i will say i was more emotionally attached to Andrew than Jay, but them together scratched that fucked up itch i have for murderous couples. 

This book has a very bleak tone throughout its entirety. 

 It presents gay issues through immoral characters, it stays consistent in its themes. The lack of anyone having good morals is depressing, it still makes you still feel for some characters that horrible stuff happens, but yeah. 

 The narration is intentionally offensive a lot of the time since it's either narrated by a serial killer or an abusive boyfriend. There's a lot of flowery language around gore and glorification of abuse (as expected when the cast includes serial killers). 

 I struggle with my thoughts on it, I am not very familiar with gay scenes despite being gay myself, and this book features the worst aspects of it. Makes you feel you shouldn't trust anyone ever. 

Nota

This book has a very bleak tone throughout its entirety. 

 It presents gay issues through immoral characters, it stays consistent in its themes. The lack of anyone having good morals is depressing, it still makes you still feel for some characters that horrible stuff happens, but yeah. 

 The narration is intentionally offensive a lot of the time since it's either narrated by a serial killer or an abusive boyfriend. There's a lot of flowery language around gore and glorification of abuse (as expected when the cast includes serial killers). 

 I struggle with my thoughts on it, I am not very familiar with gay scenes despite being gay myself, and this book features the worst aspects of it. Makes you feel you shouldn't trust anyone ever. 

 A lot of sadness about drugs, and HIV.

tw: gore; murder; torture; rape; necrophilia; cannibalism; homophobic and racial slurs; mentions of HIV/AIDS

ellie &
Exquisite Corpse by Poppy Z. Brite

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ellie &Exquisite Corpse by Poppy Z. Brite

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ellie &
Exquisite Corpse by Poppy Z. Brite